Anthony Lee v. Dana Inc.: Sixth Circuit Clarifies the Evidentiary Burden for “Pre-Emptive Retaliation” under Title VII and Michigan’s ELCRA

1. Introduction

Anthony Lee, a long-term Black employee at Dana, Inc.’s Michigan plant, alleged that the company retaliated against him and discriminated on the basis of race after a series of workplace disputes involving forklift safety discipline, overtime assignments, and ultimate termination.

Lee brought claims under:

• Federal Title VII (retaliation, discrimination, hostile work environment);
• Michigan’s Elliot-Larsen Civil Rights Act (ELCRA) on parallel theories; and
• A Michigan public-policy wrongful-discharge theory.

The district court granted summary judgment for Dana; the Sixth Circuit affirmed in a non-precedential opinion. Although the panel leaves existing doctrine intact, it provides a detailed roadmap showing what evidence is—and is not—sufficient to withstand summary judgment when the alleged retaliation precedes the formal filing of a charge.

2. Summary of the Judgment

• Retaliation (Title VII & ELCRA): Even assuming that Lee’s preparatory steps (requesting his personnel file, voicing internal complaints) qualified as protected activity, he failed to produce evidence causally linking those activities to his discharge. Temporal proximity and a “disciplinary uptick” alone were insufficient.
• Racial Discrimination: Lee could not identify valid comparators who were similarly situated and treated better, nor rebut Dana’s non-discriminatory explanations.
• Hostile Work Environment: The episodes Lee cited were not shown to be race-based, nor sufficiently severe or pervasive.
• Michigan Public-Policy Tort: Lee’s refusal to sign a safety-acknowledgment form was not shown to be a factor in his termination.
• Outcome: Summary judgment for Dana affirmed in full.

3. Analysis

3.1 Precedents Cited and Their Influence

1. Niswander v. Cincinnati Ins. – Restates the four-part prima facie retaliation test; guided the court’s framework.
2. Booker v. Brown & Williamson – Recognizes that instigation of proceedings (e.g., gathering info to file a charge) can be protected. The panel assumed arguendo that Lee fit within Booker, but still required proof of causation.
3. Cooper v. City of North Olmsted – Warns that a spike in discipline unaccompanied by evidence of retaliatory motive is not enough. The court analogized Lee’s situation to Cooper.
4. Nguyen v. City of Cleveland – Holds temporal proximity alone is rarely compelling; applied to discount Lee’s timing argument.
5. Imwalle v. Reliance Medical & Donald v. Sybra – Provide contrasting examples of when temporal proximity, plus context, can or cannot establish pretext; cited to show Lee lacked corroborating facts.
6. Mickey v. Zeidler Tool & Die – ELCRA standard (“significant factor”) noted to be even tougher than Title VII’s “causal connection.”
7. White v. Baxter Healthcare – Governs Title VII discrimination burden-shifting; applied to Lee’s disparate-treatment claim.
8. Clay v. UPS – Clarifies that facially neutral conduct can be race-based if evidence shows race was the “but-for” reason; court found Lee provided none.
9. Suchodolski & Landin – Michigan cases defining wrongful-discharge public-policy exceptions; the panel held Lee’s facts did not fit.

3.2 Key Legal Reasoning

1. Protected Activity vs. Causation.
   • The court accepted arguendo that Lee’s preparatory steps met the protected-activity prong.
   • It nevertheless required direct or circumstantial proof linking those steps to the firing. Emails documenting management’s reasons (attendance violations, harassment complaint) undercut Lee’s theory.
2. Temporal Proximity Insufficiency.
   • A one-month gap between Lee’s file request and new discipline was “not particularly compelling” under Nguyen, especially given a record of legitimate performance issues.
3. Comparator Flaws.
   • To show disparate treatment, comparators must share relevant traits and infractions.
   • Lee’s proposed comparators had different safety histories or disciplinary records; thus no inference of race animus.
4. Hostile-Environment Threshold.
   • Absent racial animus or severe/pervasive conduct, supervisory rudeness and overtime disputes do not create actionable hostility.
5. Michigan Public Policy Claim.
   • Even if pressuring an employee to waive claims could violate public policy, Lee supplied no evidence that his refusal to sign the “safety rules” memo played any role in his discharge.

3.3 Impact of the Decision

• Evidentiary Clarity: The opinion underscores that mere suspicion of “pre-emptive retaliation” will not survive summary judgment without concrete proof of retaliatory motive.
• Employer Compliance Strategies: Emails memorializing legitimate business reasons were pivotal. Employers are reminded to contemporaneously document performance-based decisions.
• Litigation Guidance for Plaintiffs: Potential litigants must gather comparator data, expose factual inaccuracies in employer justifications, or adduce discriminatory remarks—timing alone rarely suffices.
• ELCRA Alignment: The panel’s treatment aligns ELCRA retaliation analysis closely with federal standards, continuing a trend of interpretive harmony.
• Forklift-Safety Settlements: The court implicitly approves non-precedential, safety-related agreements that require acknowledgment of rules, so long as there is no evidence they chill protected rights.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

• Summary Judgment: A procedural device allowing courts to dispose of cases lacking a genuine factual dispute, avoiding a full trial.
• Prima Facie Case: The initial, minimal set of facts a plaintiff must show to raise a legal presumption of wrongdoing.
• Protected Activity: Conduct (complaints, inquiries, EEOC filings) shielded from employer retaliation by law.
• Causal Connection: A link showing the protected activity was a motivating—or under ELCRA, a “significant”—factor in the adverse action.
• Pretext: A false reason offered by an employer to hide unlawful motive. Plaintiffs rebut by showing the stated reason is factually wrong, insufficient, or did not actually motivate the action.
• Comparator: A similarly situated employee outside the plaintiff’s protected class, used to demonstrate unequal treatment.
• Temporal Proximity: The closeness in time between protected conduct and adverse action. Helpful but rarely decisive by itself.

5. Conclusion

In Anthony Lee v. Dana Inc. the Sixth Circuit sharpened the contours of “pre-emptive retaliation”: preparatory steps toward filing a discrimination charge can be protected, but plaintiffs must still connect the dots between those steps and the employer’s adverse action with more than suspicious timing. The decision reinforces the high evidentiary threshold at the summary-judgment stage for retaliation, discrimination, and hostile-environment claims, and it cautions employees that performance-related infractions, if well-documented, will defeat civil-rights suits absent affirmative proof of illicit motive.

For practitioners, the case highlights:

• The strategic importance of contemporaneous documentation by employers;
• The necessity for plaintiffs to select true comparators and marshal objective evidence undermining employer explanations; and
• The continued reluctance of courts to infer discrimination solely from proximity in time or generalized workplace grievances.

Although designated “Not Recommended for Publication,” the opinion provides a valuable primer on current Sixth Circuit thinking and will likely be cited in district-court briefing whenever plaintiffs rely primarily on timing and disciplinary upticks to prove retaliation or discrimination.