The U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals (whose rulings apply to all West Virginia employers) has been busy deciding Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) accommodation cases this year. In at least two cases, it found that the employees were not protected by the ADA with regard to discrimination and failure-to-accommodate claims because they were not “qualified individuals”—that is, their legitimate medical restrictions did not permit them from performing their essential job functions.
Case #1: Inability to Perform In-Office Functions and Job Abandonment
In a case decided on January 14, 2026, an employee with breast cancer claimed her employer, a private aviation services provider, violated the ADA. The employee worked in accounts payable as an accounting assistant and had various duties (for example, handling paper checks, mail, and filing) that had to be done on-site—they could not be performed remotely.
During the pandemic, many of the provider’s employees worked hybrid schedules, working remotely part of the time and in the office part of the time. Unfortunately, the accounting assistant developed an aggressive form of breast cancer during that time and eventually had to go fully remote as a result. Her in-person responsibilities were reassigned to the account manager. The reassignment didn’t pose a problem during the pandemic because business slowed so much that the account manager could handle the workload. But when business largely returned to normal by March 2021, the account manager got swamped.
At two different times over the next couple of months, the accounting assistant agreed to work in the office two days a week as her schedule permitted. However, she didn’t return to the office as planned until she was told she needed to do so. Then, she managed to work in the office only two partial days because of her condition and medical appointments. Afterward, she didn’t return to in-office work.
In early June, the company told the accounting assistant to return her computer, which made it impossible for her to work from home. Also, she had another surgery and was unable to work afterward, informing the employer she would take sick days until she could return but failing to say how long that would be. Several days later, the employer received a letter from her doctor stating she would need to be off work until June 17. The employer then contacted her, stressing the need to be communicative about work absences and asking her to be in touch on June 16 so they could plan for her return to work the following day. However, she did not contact her employer and did not return to work on the 17. The employer then discharged her for job abandonment.
Case #2: Inability to Perform Essential Physical Functions of Job
The second case was decided on February 4, 2026. There, a salaried rehang supervisor at a chicken-processing plant was seriously injured when he was shot by an unknown assailant at a non-work event. He took his full 12 weeks of Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) leave. His doctor cleared him to work the day after his FMLA leave expired but with various restrictions, including that he was to perform only seated work, with no use of his left arm and significant restrictions on the use of this right arm. Afterward, he used the rest of his vacation time to take another leave of absence, during which his doctor maintained the same restrictions.
The rehang supervisor then engaged in the interactive process with his employer to determine whether his restrictions could be accommodated. As part of the process, the employer provided him with a list of physical demands for his job, including standing and walking for long periods, occasional lifting and carrying 50 pounds, and pushing and pulling, among others. The rehang supervisor spent about 75% to 80% of his time walking. After viewing the list, his doctor revised his work restrictions but still restricted him to no use of his left arm; no lifting, pushing, or pulling more than five pounds with his right arm; and sedentary work with limited standing and walking.
The employer reviewed the restrictions and determined the rehang supervisor could not be reasonably accommodated in his position and that there were no available, vacant positions he could perform with his restrictions. Therefore, he was discharged but was informed that he was eligible for rehire and that he could claim long-term disability benefits.
Neither Employee Was A ‘Qualified Individual’
In both cases, the employees claimed discrimination (wrongful discharge) and failure to accommodate under the ADA. The 4th Circuit rejected the ADA claims filed by both employees because neither one could perform their essential job functions and thus neither was a “qualified individual” protected by the ADA.
To be protected by the ADA, the court pointed out, an employee must be able to perform their essential job functions with or without a reasonable accommodation. In the accounting assistant’s case, the court emphasized three points:
- An employee who cannot perform a job may still be a “qualified individual” if a reasonable accommodation enables her to perform the job.
- The employee must be able to perform the job’s “essential functions,” and it is the employer’s place to decide which functions of a job are essential. The court’s function is only to ensure that the essential functions identified by the employer bear more than a marginal relationship to the job, based on any available evidence, including the job description and senior employees’ testimony.
- The definition of “qualified individual” impliedly includes a reciprocal obligation of both the employer and the employee to engage in a good-faith, collaborative search for a reasonable accommodation; this is generally called the “interactive process.” If the employee fails to engage in the process, she has no claim against the employer.
Regarding the accounting assistant, the court found that some essential functions of the job at issue had to be performed in the office, as evidenced by her job description, testimony by another employee, and the employee’s own attestations. The employer wasn’t obligated to split those duties among other employees.
The accounting assistant argued that, as an accommodation, she should be given a hybrid schedule—but the court rejected the argument because she, not the employer, had reneged on the hybrid arrangement she had agreed to. The court found it important that, after she began a hybrid schedule, she came into the office for just two partial days and continually failed to communicate about her absences with the employer.
The court also found that the employer acted lawfully when it required the accounting assistant to return her computer to incentivize her to return to the office because, if an employee rejects an obvious and helpful offer (like the offer of a hybrid schedule, which the employee said she would accept but didn’t follow through with), the employer isn’t required to make a different offer.
Ultimately, the court found the accounting assistant—although she was legitimately suffering from cancer—was not a “qualified individual” protected by the ADA because, even with the reasonable accommodation of a hybrid schedule, she could not perform her essential job functions and failed to notify the employer about her absences. The employer, on the other hand, had gone above and beyond its legal obligations by reassigning duties, permitting her to work a hybrid schedule with the freedom to choose the days and times she would work in the office, taking precautions to minimize her exposure to illness in the office, repeatedly trying to work things out with her after she went back on her word, and deciding not to discipline her for missing work before she provided a doctor’s note explaining the absence.
Regarding the rehang supervisor, the court’s analysis was brief. The record, the court stated, reflected his inability to perform the physical aspects of his essential job functions at the time he was discharged. Thus, he was not a “qualified individual,” which “doom[ed]” his wrongful discharge and failure-to-accommodate claims.
Takeaways
In its recent decisions, the 4th Circuit has made clear that it will not find discrimination or failure to accommodate when the employee cannot (or will not) perform essential job functions as defined by the employer. The 4th Circuit will also appropriately deny a claim when it is the employee who causes a breakdown in the interactive process or reneges on an agreement for a particular accommodation. That said, there are important lessons for employers to be found in these decisions.
For one, it’s important for you to define the essential functions of each job, and it’s wise to put those essential functions in writing—for example, in job descriptions—and to provide them to the employees holding those jobs. The essential functions should bear more than a marginal relationship to the job. That said, if a position even occasionally requires a certain function—like lifting, for example—that should be included in your list of essential functions for the job.
Another lesson from these decisions is that you need to go through with the interactive process in good faith, trying to determine whether a reasonable accommodation exists that will permit the employee to perform essential job functions. If the employee causes a breakdown in this process, you have a defense. If you cause the breakdown, that defense is gone.
Additionally, you may go above and beyond your ADA duties without incurring liability as a result (though you need not do so under the law). But if it’s clear that no reasonable accommodation will permit the employee to perform the essential job functions, and they have exhausted all FMLA (and other available) leave, you don’t have to continue to employ them.
A final note: The ADA’s antiretaliation provisions protect employees regardless of whether they are “qualified individuals.” That is, regardless of whether an employee is a “qualified individual,” they may have a claim if you retaliate against them for engaging in protected activity. Don’t assume that just because an employee is not a “qualified individual,” they have no protection under the ADA.
Kaitlin L.H. Robidoux is an attorney with Steptoe & Johnson PLLC in Bridgeport, West Virginia, and can be reached at 304-933-8161 or kaitlin.robidoux@steptoe-johnson.com.