A Tennessee jury has awarded a former BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee research scientist $687,000 in back pay and damages after she was fired in 2021 for refusing to take the COVID-19 vaccine.
After a three-day jury trial in Chattanooga last week, a federal jury ruled that BlueCross failed to provide reasonable accommodation to Tanja Benton, who did most of her work from home and claimed a religious exemption from the company’s vaccination requirement.
Chattanooga attorney Doug S. Hamill, who is representing Benton, said the biostatistics researcher was fired in November 2021 in violation of her religious beliefs after working for the Chattanooga-based health insurer for nearly six and a half years. Benton said she believed COVID-19 vaccines were derived from cell lines from aborted fetuses.
“Because of his sincerely held religious beliefs regarding abortion, (Benton) cannot in good conscience consume the vaccine, which would not only defile his body but also anger and dishonor God,” Hamill said in his lawsuit against BlueCross.
According to National Geographic, fetal cells have been used in the development or testing of COVID-19 vaccines, but were not part of them. The cells are grown in the lab and come from abortions that occurred more than three decades ago. Cell lines are used in similar ways in drugs such as acetaminophen, ibuprofen, and aspirin.
Benton also claimed she could continue to do her job from home at any time, something BlueCross did not allow her to do.
Hamill said Benton’s job rarely involved direct interaction with customers, with only 1% of his total annual work hours involving customer interaction. In the complaint, Hamill said Benton “never performed work or attended meetings at medical facilities where patients were being treated” and “physical, in-person interaction with co-workers was never a requirement of the position.”
(READ MORE: BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee to require all workers to get COVID-19 vaccine)
OTHER CLAIMS
Benton is the first BlueCross employee fired over the vaccine mandate to win an award from the company. Other fired employees at the company are also suing BlueCross, including several who have joined a class action lawsuit against BlueCross after initially filing complaints with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
But at least one other lawsuit filed by a former BlueCross employee who was fired for not taking the vaccine has been dismissed. Brandi Goodwin filed a similar lawsuit against BlueCross in 2022, but the case was dismissed the following year when she failed to amend the complaint as ordered by the court.
Dalya Qualls White, BlueCross’ senior vice president and chief communications officer, said Monday that the company was “disappointed by the jury’s decision” last week in Benton’s favor, but she declined to immediately say whether it would be appealed.
“We believe the vaccination mandate was the best decision for the health and safety of our employees, members and the broader community, given the circumstances and federal guidelines in place at the time,” White said in an emailed statement Monday. “We appreciate the service our former employees provided to our members and communities throughout their time with our company.”
(SIGN UP: Get Chattanooga area news, sports and entertainment delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for our free newsletters at timesfreepress.com/newsletters.)
In late 2021, BlueCross began requiring its employees to be vaccinated against the virus, unless they had a religious objection or health reason for not getting vaccinated. Over objections from Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee and others, the insurer said that as a federal contractor, it must comply with a White House directive requiring all its employees to be vaccinated by Dec. 8, 2021.
“We believe our accommodation of the vaccination requirement is in accordance with the law,” Alison Sexter, a spokeswoman for BlueCross, said in a statement Monday.
In October 2021, 19 BlueCross employees were laid off because of the vaccine mandate, Hamill said, and in November 2021, another 22 BlueCross employees lost their jobs just weeks before a Tennessee law was passed to prevent BlueCross from moving forward with the vaccine mandate.
“From the beginning of these forced vaccination campaigns, BlueCross and BlueShield of Tennessee’s position was clear: no vaccine, no job,” Hamill said. “Religious exemptions were ignored and no attempt was made to retain these employees, some of whom have served BCBST for more than two decades.”
According to Vanderbilt University, most major religions have no theological objection to vaccination, including Catholics, Orthodox Christians, Amish, Anglicans, Baptists, Mormons, Methodists and many others.
The university found that six denominations had theological objections: Dutch Reformed Congregations, Faith Tabernacle, Church of the Firstborn, Faith Assembly and End Times Ministries.
Hamill said Benton was a nondenominational Christian.
(READ MORE: Tennessee lawmakers limit COVID-19 mandates)
EXECUTIVE ORDER
In September 2021, President Joe Biden issued an executive order requiring federal contractors and subcontractors to comply with workplace safety guidelines developed by a federal task force. The task force then issued guidance that new, renewed, or extended contracts include a clause requiring employees to be fully vaccinated by January 18, 2022.
But before the vaccination requirement for most federal contractors could take effect, a federal judge struck down the White House directive.
Former Tennessee Attorney General Herbert Slatery III was among a group of state attorneys general who filed a lawsuit to block the vaccine requirement for federal contractors, calling Biden’s vaccine mandate “illegal and unconstitutional.”
In October 2021, during a politically charged special session of the Tennessee General Assembly to address the COVID-19 outbreak, state Rep. John Ragan read aloud an email from BlueCross employee Heather Smith objecting to her employer’s vaccine mandate. Smith claimed that her religious objections to the vaccine were being ignored and that she was seeking “legislative protection for … individual rights and freedoms related to the vaccine mandate.”
Smith was fired less than a week after she filed her written complaints with lawmakers. She sued, but her dismissal complaint was dismissed by a Hamilton County judge. She appealed, and the Tennessee Court of Appeals ruled in Smith’s favor, establishing — for the first time — that the right of Tennessee employees to petition lawmakers trumps Tennessee’s employment-at-will doctrine, which gives companies the power to fire any employee for almost any reason.
Contact Dave Flessner at dflessner@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6340.