Federal judge dismisses discrimination claims against NPR

A federal judge has dismissed the majority of a discrimination lawsuit filed in 2022 against NPR.

In the lawsuit, a former NPR broadcast engineering director alleged that NPR discriminated against him based on race and age and retaliated by denying him promotions and equal pay. 

The plaintiff, Kevin Langley, argued that he was fraudulently induced to sign a separation agreement that released NPR from claims of discrimination and retaliation. In his lawsuit, Langley, who is Black, claimed that white colleagues called him “boy” in closed-door meetings. He also described performance reviews in which his supervisor said he was “out of date” and “used management approaches from the past.”

In her May 30 decision, U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruled that the separation agreement was “not rescindable.” 

Langley, who worked at NPR as director of broadcast operations, also alleged that NPR breached the agreement, which stipulated a lump sum payment of $20,000 for medical insurance. He began at NPR in 1994 until NPR eliminated his position in 2019. 

Langley didn’t receive the payment until about four months after leaving NPR, according to the judge’s order. 

Jackson did not rule on the lump sum issue but ordered the parties to “meet and confer and propose a schedule for any further proceedings” by June 20. 

“While the facts that bear on the late payment are largely undisputed, it is not clear whether the parties are agreed as to the existence or amount of damages,” she wrote.

Jackson also denied NPR’s motion for summary judgment on an “unjust enrichment” counterclaim. Because Langley claimed that the separation agreement was invalid, NPR took the position that Langley should have offered to repay the money from the separation agreement. Repaying the money “would be contrary to the parties’ intentions when the contract was negotiated,” the judge ruled.