Cormier v. McDonough ( 2022 )

Case: 22-20083 Document: 00516554827 Page: 1 Date Filed: 11/22/2022
United States Court of Appeals
for the Fifth Circuit United States Court of Appeals
Fifth Circuit
FILED
November 22, 2022
No. 22-20083 Lyle W. Cayce
Clerk
Ronda L. Cormier,
Plaintiff—Appellant,
versus
Denis McDonough, Secretary of Veterans Affairs,
Defendant—Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Texas
USDC No. 4:19-CV-4960
Before Smith, Barksdale, and Haynes, Circuit Judges.
Per Curiam:*
Department of Veteran Affairs (“VA”) attorney Ronda Cormier
(“Cormier”), proceeding pro se, appeals the district court’s grant of
summary judgment on her discrimination-based claims. However, instead of
addressing the merits of the case, she asserts only that the district court
misperceived her Second Amended Complaint (“SAC”). Because Cormier
*
Pursuant to 5th Circuit Rule 47.5, the court has determined that this
opinion should not be published and is not precedent except under the limited
circumstances set forth in 5th Circuit Rule 47.5.4.
Case: 22-20083 Document: 00516554827 Page: 2 Date Filed: 11/22/2022
No. 22-20083
wholly fails to mention—much less brief—any of her claims on appeal, we
AFFIRM the district court’s judgment.
Cormier, an African American female attorney, worked in the Office
of General Counsel for the VA Medical Center in Houston, Texas.
Following a series of disputes regarding accommodations for her alleged
disabilities and subsequent performance issues, Cormier filed suit against the
VA, asserting Title VII disparate treatment, hostile work environment, and
retaliation claims, along with claims for violations of the Rehabilitation and
Privacy Acts. Cormier amended her complaint twice, but her final SAC did
not include her Title VII retaliation and Rehabilitation Act claims. The
district court granted summary judgment in favor of the VA on all claims,
including those Cormier failed to plead in the SAC. The court explained that
Cormier abandoned her previously pled Title VII retaliation and
Rehabilitation Act claims by failing to include them in the live pleading.
Importantly, though, the district court also ruled that even if the claims
remained live, they did not survive summary judgment. Cormier timely
appealed.
Cormier purports to appeal “the judgment to the extent it dismissed
her case,” but then she spends her entire brief arguing about whether her
SAC was an amended or a supplemental complaint. She does not devote
even a single sentence of her appellate briefs to the substance of her claims
upon which the district court expressly ruled. Accordingly, these claims are
waived. See Willis v. Cleco Corp., 749 F.3d 314, 319 (5th Cir. 2014) (“A party
that asserts an argument on appeal, but fails to adequately brief it, is deemed
to have waived it.” (quotation omitted)). Indeed, we have reiterated that a
litigant may not preserve her claims by merely mentioning them—she must
“press” them by, at the very least, “identify[ing] the relevant legal standards
and any Fifth Circuit Cases.” Id. (emphasis added) (quotation omitted).
Having failed to “identify a theory as a proposed basis for deciding the
2
Case: 22-20083 Document: 00516554827 Page: 3 Date Filed: 11/22/2022
No. 22-20083
claim,” or otherwise “explain, in any perceptible manner, why the facts
would allow a reasonable jury to decide in [her] favor,” Cormier neglected to
adequately brief her claims, and they are, as noted, therefore waived. Id.Cormier’s lengthy discussion of her argument that the district court
erred in concluding that some of her claims were abandoned by her
superseding SAC does not save her appeal. Even assuming arguendo that
Cormier is correct, the district court nonetheless reviewed the purportedly
mooted claims on the merits of the summary judgment motion and concluded
that they, too, failed to raise the requisite genuine dispute of material fact.
Because the district court adjudicated all of her claims and Cormier fails to
brief why this conclusion was incorrect, the appeal of the claims is waived. 1
Accordingly, we AFFIRM.
1
In her reply brief, Cormier challenged the district court’s failure to explain that
conclusion, asserting that “[a] conclusion without reason or explanation may lead to an
erroneous result.” Of course, because a grant of a summary judgment is reviewed de novo,
the lack of detailed reasoning does not prevent this court from affirming that decision.
Hernandez v. Yellow Transp., Inc., 670 F.3d 644, 658 (5th Cir. 2012) (explaining that this
court may “affirm a district court on any basis established by the record.”). Even in the
reply brief, Cormier did not address the merits.
3