Company’s DEI interview quota policy harmed White men, lawsuit alleges

Summary

A proposed class-action suit filed Sept. 15 alleges Danaher Corp. ran a diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) interview-quota policy that discriminated against qualified White male and older employees. The complaint, Critelli v. Danaher Corp., was brought by two White male engineers over 40 who worked at Pall Corp., a Danaher subsidiary in Deland, Florida.

Plaintiffs say Danaher required that 50% of interview candidates for openings be women or people of colour and that the company altered job descriptions, loosened requirements for preferred groups and even filled candidate pools artificially to meet quotas. They claim this blocked merit-based hiring and promotions between 2021 and 2025 and have sued under Title VII and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act. Danaher declined to comment to HR Dive.

Key Points

The lawsuit alleges Danaher requires 50% of interviewees for open roles to be women or people of colour across subsidiaries.
Plaintiffs say job descriptions and requirements were changed so underrepresented applicants need not meet the same standards as White men.
Managers allegedly had compensation and performance tied to meeting DEI goals, pressuring candidate selection.
Plaintiffs claim they were repeatedly denied interviews for promotions they were qualified for from 2021–2025.
The suit invokes Title VII and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act; broader context includes recent legal scrutiny of race- and sex-conscious programmes and EEOC guidance warning against unlawful preferences.

Context and relevance

The case lands amid heightened legal scrutiny of DEI initiatives following the Supreme Court’s 2023 admissions rulings and executive and regulatory pushes to limit race- or sex-based preferences. The EEOC has reiterated that DEI programmes do not override longstanding prohibitions on using protected characteristics in hiring decisions. HR and legal teams should watch this and similar suits as they test the boundary between lawful diversity efforts and unlawful quotas or set-asides.

Why should I read this?

Quick and blunt: if you hire, manage or design DEI programmes, this is a red-alert. The complaint shows what gets companies sued — quotas, tied comp, and tinkering with job requirements. Save yourself the headache: check whether your policies could be read as mandatory preferences and whether hiring is defensibly merit-based.