Search

In 1990, Congress enacted the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”) to eliminate widespread discrimination against disabled persons. The Act requires private employers to provide reasonable accommodations to disabled employees to allow them to continue performing essential job functions. One accommodation in particular has divided the U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeals: reassigning disabled employees to vacant positions. Due to a current circuit split, it is unclear if employers must reassign disabled employees despite maintaining policies of choosing the best-qualified employees for reassignment. This Note argues that both the text of the ADA and the ADA’s legislative history support automatic reassignments when no other reasonable accommodations allow a disabled employee to perform his or her essential job functions. Although reassignments pose several unique concerns, they are adequately addressed through existing statutory safeguards and U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission regulations. Noncompetitive reassignments should be given teeth either through a congressional amendment or through future court cases.

On March 8, 2013, in United States v. Cotterman, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit—sitting en banc—held that U.S. border agents must have a reasonable suspicion of criminal activity before conducting a forensic search of an electronic storage device at the border. In reaching this conclusion, the court narrowed existing federal appeals court precedents, which held that manual searches of electronic storage devices do not require any suspicion. This Comment argues that a reasonable suspicion requirement is illogical, harmful to national security, and administratively impractical. Instead, strengthening existing federal regulations is a better method to protect personal privacy interests.