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By Billal Rahman
Immigration Reporter
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A white Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) employee has won the right to pursue part of her racial discrimination lawsuit after a federal judge ruled that some of her claims could move forward, while dismissing others, according to court filings.
A federal judge in Washington, D.C., has allowed portions of a lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to proceed, while throwing out several claims brought by the ICE employee, according to a ruling issued on April 14.
U.S. District Judge Dabney L. Friedrich found that Karen Sieger, an IT cybersecurity specialist at ICE, plausibly alleged that she was denied two leadership positions because of her race, allowing those claims to continue, according to court documents reviewed by Newsweek.
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Sieger sued DHS under the Civil Rights Act, alleging that a supervisor repeatedly favored another employee in a series of promotions within ICE's Cyber Crimes Center, court filings showed. She accused the agency of racial discrimination, retaliation and creating a hostile work environment.
The court allowed Sieger's discrimination claims related to the acting unit chief and unit chief positions to continue, finding that she identified irregularities in the hiring process that could support an inference of discrimination.
According to the complaint, Sieger alleged that her supervisor selected another employee, Kanika Cooper, for multiple leadership roles between 2019 and 2021, including positions that were allegedly not properly announced or for which Cooper was less qualified.
Sieger also alleged that hiring criteria were changed, additional interview rounds were added and other procedural steps were altered in ways that ultimately favored Cooper, court filings showed.
In her opinion, Friedrich noted that allegations Cooper was selected for the unit chief role despite lacking a required year of experience at the GS-14 level could, if proved, support a claim of discrimination.
The judge also pointed to claims that interview panels initially ranked Sieger ahead of Cooper before additional interviews were introduced.
However, the judge dismissed Sieger's claim related to a separate section chief position, finding that she did not seek Equal Employment Opportunity counseling within the required 45-day window after learning of the promotion.
Friedrich also rejected Sieger's claims that she was subjected to a hostile work environment or retaliation, writing that the alleged conduct—including exclusion from meetings, criticism of work performance and strained workplace interactions—did not meet the legal threshold under federal law and was not sufficiently connected to her race or protected activity.
"Sieger fails to state a plausible hostile work environment claim because the 'ostracization' she endured was not sufficiently severe or pervasive," the judge wrote.
The ruling grants the government's motion to dismiss in part and denies it in part. The case now proceeds on Sieger's remaining discrimination claims involving the acting unit chief and unit chief positions.
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