White man fired from hospital in diversity initiative WINS $10 MILLION discrimination lawsuit
A white senior hospital executive who lost his job in a push to diversify its leadership team has won a $10 million lawsuit, with a federal jury agreeing that his employers fired him based on his race.
In a 2019 lawsuit, David Duvall claimed that Novant Health violated his civil rights when the company fired him a year earlier and replaced him with two women, one black and one white. Duvall, who had worked for the firm in North Carolina for nearly five years, was abruptly fired amid a company-wide push to diversify top leadership positions, according to reports at the time.
BREAKING REPORT: White male marketing VP David Duvall at North Carolina hospital WINS 10-MILLION 'REVERSE DISCRIMINATION' payout after he was replaced by two women - one of whom is black - as part of diversity and inclusion program..
— Chuck Callesto (@ChuckCallesto) October 27, 2021
He argued that he was fired for no other reason than his race, and a federal jury sided with him on Wednesday, Associated Press reported.
The jury held that Novant Health violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits race- and gender-based discrimination in the workplace, and awarded Duvall $10 million.
The verdict was celebrated online by conservatives, who have long felt that diversity initiatives are used to unfairly root white males out of jobs. Some companies have openly stated that this is their goal, and a 2016 Harvard study found that the presence of corporate diversity policies signal to “white men that they might be undervalued and discriminated against” while doing little to reassure minorities that they will be treated more fairly than at a company without such policies.
Never quit, never step aside Wage lawfare, make them pay https://t.co/MZF2aylIFw
— Auron MacIntyre (@AuronMacintyre) October 27, 2021
Duvall’s complaint stated that he wasn’t the only white executive fired during Novant Health’s diversity drive. The company’s chief legal officer, medical group president, chief information officer, patient experience officer, and president of Haymarket Medical Center were all replaced either by a black person or a woman in the 18 months after Duvall was let go, the Daily Mail reported.
Novant argued that Duvall was fired due to “deficient performance,” and the company told the Mail that “this verdict [would] not change Novant Health’s steadfast commitment to diversity, inclusion and equity for all.”
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