NMHRA Vaccine-Exemption Pleading Rule: Disability Claims Must Allege a Major Life Activity; Common-Law Retaliation Must Cite a Clear Public Policy

1. Introduction

In Spinelli v. Coherus Biosciences, Inc. (10th Cir. Feb. 25, 2026), plaintiff Mark W. Spinelli challenged his termination from Coherus Biosciences after he refused a mandatory COVID-19 vaccine and sought medical and religious exemptions. Spinelli alleged (i) disability/serious medical condition discrimination and retaliation under the New Mexico Human Rights Act (NMHRA) and (ii) common-law retaliatory discharge under New Mexico public-policy doctrine.

The central issues on appeal were pleading and causation: whether Spinelli plausibly alleged a qualifying NMHRA disability/serious medical condition, whether he plausibly alleged retaliation causation, and whether he identified a sufficiently “clear mandate of public policy” to support common-law retaliation. He also challenged the denial of post-dismissal relief and sought leave to amend.

2. Summary of the Opinion

The Tenth Circuit affirmed. It held:

  • NMHRA disability/serious medical condition discrimination: Spinelli failed to plausibly allege a qualifying impairment because his complaint did not identify any major life activity that was substantially limited.
  • NMHRA retaliation: Spinelli failed to plausibly allege a causal connection between protected activity (requesting an exemption/opposing a policy) and termination; the timeline pled was too long to infer causation by temporal proximity alone under circuit precedent, and the allegations suggested he was terminated for noncompliance with a generally applicable vaccination policy.
  • Common-law retaliation: Spinelli failed to plead a claim because he did not identify, in the complaint, a specific statutory or decisional source for the public policy allegedly violated.
  • Post-judgment relief/amendment: The district court did not abuse discretion under Rule 59(e), and denying leave to amend was proper where the case was closed and no viable amended complaint was presented.

3. Analysis

3.1 Precedents Cited

A. Appellate jurisdiction and finality

  • Moya v. Schollenbarger (quoting Petty v. Manpower, Inc.) supplied the framework for determining whether an ambiguous dismissal “without prejudice” is final for appellate jurisdiction. The panel relied on the later order (denying reconsideration) and party agreement to infer finality.
  • The court reiterated Rule 58 practice concerns by citing Bankers Tr. Co. v. Mallis and Warren v. Am. Bankers Ins. of Fla., stressing the importance of a separate judgment document even though the absence did not defeat jurisdiction here.

B. Motion to dismiss and pleading standards

  • The standard of review and pleading framework came from Porter v. Ford Motor Co. (de novo review), Nat'l Rifle Ass'n of Am. v. Vullo (accept well-pled facts, reasonable inferences), and the plausibility line of Ashcroft v. Iqbal and Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly (facts, not legal conclusions; plausibility over possibility).
  • The court’s refusal to consider extra-complaint detail leaned on Waller v. City & Cnty. of Denver, Jojola v. Chavez, and Cohon ex rel. Bass v. N.M. Dep't of Health—reinforcing that a motion to dismiss is decided on the complaint’s face.

C. NMHRA disability/serious medical condition analysis and ADA guidance

  • The panel emphasized New Mexico’s reliance on federal ADA standards via Trujillo v. N. Rio Arriba Elec. Co-op, Inc. (which quotes White v. York Int'l Corp.). The opinion treated the NMHRA claim as effectively tracking ADA disability elements.
  • At minimum, a plaintiff must identify a major life activity, relying on Berry v. T-Mobile USA, Inc.. The decision effectively imports that requirement into NMHRA pleading at the Rule 12(b)(6) stage.
  • The court analogized to employment-discrimination pleading discipline from Khalik v. United Air Lines (general assertions are insufficient).
  • Spinelli’s reliance on Allen v. SouthCrest Hospital was unavailing; even there (on summary judgment), conclusory statements about life-activity limitation were insufficient without specifics and comparative context.

D. NMHRA retaliation causation (temporal proximity and “but-for” framing)

  • The elements were taken from Juneau v. Intel Corp., which noted (without fully adopting) the Tenth Circuit’s temporal-proximity inference approach.
  • For temporal proximity alone, the court relied on Meiners v. University of Kansas to hold that roughly two months (and here, pled as about two-and-a-half months) is too attenuated to infer causation absent additional allegations.
  • While Spinelli invoked Metzler v. Fed. Home Loan Bank of Topeka for the proposition that pleading need not establish a prima facie case, the panel used Khalik v. United Air Lines to explain that elements still guide plausibility.
  • The court found persuasive a similar vaccine-policy termination analysis in Bereznak v. Arrow Elecs., Inc. and also cited Sharikov v. Philips Med. Sys. MR, Inc. (Second Circuit) for the broader proposition that termination for noncompliance with a neutral vaccine policy is not plausibly retaliation absent more.

E. Common-law retaliatory discharge and “clear mandate of public policy”

  • The controlling New Mexico formulation came from Sherrill v. Farmers Ins. Exch.: identify a specific expression of public policy; act in furtherance of it; termination because of those acts.
  • The panel noted New Mexico’s reluctance to treat refusal to follow internal employment policies as public-policy protected conduct, citing Paca v. K-Mart Corp..
  • The parties’ broader dispute (left unresolved) referenced Cordova v. New Mexico and Chavez v. Qwest, Inc., reflecting competing lines on whether statutory remedies displace common-law discharge claims.

F. Rule 59(e), post-judgment amendment, and futility

  • The Rule 59(e) standard and deference came from Nelson v. City of Albuquerque and Pueblo of Jemez v. United States (quoting Eaton v. Pacheco). The limited grounds for reconsideration came from Servants of Paraclete v. Does.
  • The sequence requirement—reopen under Rule 59(e) or 60(b) before amending under Rule 15—came from Calderon v. Kansas Dep't of Soc. & Rehab. Servs..
  • The panel used United States v. Rodriguez to affirm on any adequate record basis.
  • Futility doctrine came from Castanon v. Cathey (de novo when denial rests on futility) and Gohier v. Enright (amendment futile if subject to dismissal).

3.2 Legal Reasoning

A. Disability/serious medical condition: pleading must connect impairment to a major life activity

Spinelli alleged a prior vaccine injury causing paralysis and “permanent” nerve damage and alleged that his provider recommended he not receive available COVID-19 vaccines. The court did not dispute that these allegations describe a medical history; the defect was categorical: the complaint did not allege that the impairment substantially limits any major life activity, or even identify a major life activity at all.

A key move in the opinion is its adoption (at least “at a minimum”) of the Berry v. T-Mobile USA, Inc. requirement at the motion-to-dismiss stage: a plaintiff must identify a major life activity implicated. The court treated post-complaint elaborations—briefing and appellate arguments identifying chewing, brushing teeth, sleeping, cooking safety, etc.—as irrelevant because Rule 12(b)(6) review is confined to the complaint. This is a strict pleading discipline ruling: plausibility cannot be repaired by later narrative.

B. Retaliation: temporal proximity is not enough at the time interval pled, and the allegations point to a neutral enforcement rationale

For the retaliation claim, the court assumed arguendo that requesting an accommodation/opposing an allegedly unlawful practice could be protected activity and that termination is an adverse action. The dispute centered on causation.

Spinelli’s complaint pled only two anchor dates: initial exemption request (July 19) and termination notice (October 1/termination October 7). Under Meiners v. University of Kansas, the roughly two-to-two-and-a-half month span is too long to infer causation by temporal proximity alone. The court rejected attempts to rely on a longer “interactive process” timeline because those dates were not pled in the complaint.

Beyond timing, the court reasoned that the complaint’s own allegations suggested the termination would have occurred regardless of the exemption request: the vaccine policy applied to all employees, unvaccinated employees could not conduct face-to-face visits, and Coherus required 60% of customer interactions to be in person. This framing echoes Bereznak v. Arrow Elecs., Inc.: where the pleaded facts show discharge for noncompliance with a neutral policy, the causal inference that the employee was fired because of protected opposition is not plausible without more.

C. Common-law retaliation: “public policy” must be pled as a specific, identifiable source

New Mexico’s public-policy tort requires a “specific expression of public policy” grounded in statute or judicial decision (Sherrill v. Farmers Ins. Exch.). Spinelli pled broad policy statements (anti-discrimination and “bodily integrity/medical choice”) but did not tie them, in the complaint, to a specific statute or case as the policy source.

The panel treated that omission as a pleading failure, not a mere technicality. Importantly, it refused to infer that Spinelli meant the NMHRA to supply the policy simply because the NMHRA appeared elsewhere in the complaint. The court thus made explicit that a public-policy wrongful discharge claim must identify its normative anchor with enough specificity to be plausible on the complaint’s face.

D. Post-judgment practice: Rule 59(e) comes first, and amendment requires a concrete proposal

The court affirmed denial of Rule 59(e) relief because Spinelli did not show an intervening change in law, new evidence, or clear error/manifest injustice under Servants of Paraclete v. Does. Under Calderon v. Kansas Dep't of Soc. & Rehab. Servs., a plaintiff must reopen the judgment before Rule 15 amendment is in play; failing the Rule 59(e) threshold, there was no entitlement to amend.

Even reaching futility, the court emphasized the practical necessity of presenting an amended complaint (and noted that a blanket “reincorporates all preceding paragraphs” does not obligate the court to reconstruct a new pleading from a lengthy reconsideration motion). Without a proposed viable amended complaint, the request could be denied without legal error.

3.3 Impact

  • Higher pleading precision for NMHRA disability claims: Plaintiffs in New Mexico (and defendants litigating in federal court) can cite this decision for the proposition that NMHRA disability/serious-medical-condition claims must plead, at minimum, the major life activity affected and facts supporting substantial limitation, not merely a diagnosis or vaccine-related risk statement.
  • Vaccine-mandate termination cases: The opinion strengthens an emerging pattern (in line with Bereznak v. Arrow Elecs., Inc. and consistent with Sharikov v. Philips Med. Sys. MR, Inc.) that termination for failure to comply with a neutral vaccination policy is difficult to reframe as retaliation without concrete allegations showing differential treatment, shifting explanations, hostility to protected activity, or other non-temporal causation facts.
  • Common-law retaliatory discharge narrowed by pleading: Plaintiffs must clearly identify the statutory/case source of policy in the complaint itself. Broad constitutional rhetoric (“bodily integrity”) without a tethered legal source is unlikely to survive Rule 12(b)(6).
  • Post-dismissal amendment is not automatic: The decision underscores that once judgment is entered (or treated as final), amendment typically requires satisfying Rule 59(e)/60(b) first and presenting a concrete amended pleading showing non-futility.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

  • “Major life activity” and “substantial limitation”: Disability statutes do not treat every impairment as a legal disability. The complaint must connect the impairment to an important daily function (e.g., caring for oneself, working, walking) and allege that the impairment significantly restricts that function as compared to most people.
  • Temporal proximity: When a firing happens soon after protected activity, courts may infer causation; when months pass, courts often require additional facts (statements, disparate treatment, shifting reasons) to plausibly suggest retaliation.
  • Rule 12(b)(6) pleading focus: A motion to dismiss tests what is in the complaint. Later briefing and appellate explanations generally cannot supply missing factual allegations.
  • Common-law “public policy” wrongful discharge: This tort requires identifying a specific statute or case that clearly expresses a public policy. General fairness arguments or broad constitutional values, without a cited source and clear mandate, usually do not suffice.
  • Rule 59(e) vs. Rule 15: After a case is dismissed and treated as final, a plaintiff typically must first reopen the judgment (Rule 59(e) or 60(b)) before the court considers amendment (Rule 15). Courts also look for an actual proposed amended complaint to evaluate whether amendment would be futile.

5. Conclusion

Spinelli v. Coherus Biosciences, Inc. is a pleading-and-causation decision with practical consequences for NMHRA employment litigation, especially vaccine-policy disputes. The Tenth Circuit affirmed dismissal because the complaint did not (1) identify any major life activity substantially limited by the alleged impairment, (2) plead nonconclusory facts supporting retaliation causation beyond an attenuated timeline, or (3) identify a specific statutory or decisional public-policy source for common-law retaliatory discharge. The opinion reinforces disciplined complaint drafting and signals that courts will treat neutral vaccine-policy enforcement as a powerful alternative explanation that must be plausibly overcome at the pleading stage.