Employers
Smithfield Fresh Meats Corp. will pay $245,000 and change how it handles pregnancy accommodation requests to resolve a federal lawsuit alleging that it refused to accommodate a pregnant worker at its Tar Heel, North Carolina, pork processing facility and then fired her, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission announced Thursday, Oct. 29.
The case, EEOC v. Smithfield Fresh Meats Corp., Case No. 7:25-cv-01410, was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina on Aug. 19, 2025. It is resolved through a two-year consent decree. The EEOC’s announcement describes the claims as allegations from its lawsuit; it does not say that a court made findings on them, and it does not include a statement from the company.
What the EEOC alleged
According to the EEOC, the employee told Smithfield she was pregnant shortly after she was hired. After she was involved in a workplace accident, she began having pregnancy-related complications that required medical attention, and her physician imposed restrictions that included a lifting restriction, the agency said when it filed the suit.
The EEOC said the employee told the company about the restrictions and asked for a reasonable accommodation. According to the lawsuit, Smithfield told her it does not provide accommodations for pregnancy, required her to take unpaid leave and, about two weeks later, fired her.
The agency brought the case under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It said it filed suit only after first trying to reach a pre-litigation settlement through its conciliation process. When the suit was filed, the EEOC said it was seeking monetary damages for the employee, including compensatory and punitive damages, plus injunctive relief.
Smithfield is headquartered in Smithfield, Virginia, and the EEOC described the Tar Heel site as the largest pork processing facility in the world. The agency did not name the employee or describe her job.
Terms of the settlement
Beyond the $245,000 payment, the consent decree requires Smithfield to ensure it has effective policies and procedures for receiving and processing reasonable accommodation requests under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act. The company must provide training on the law to managers and human resources employees and send periodic reports to the EEOC during the decree’s two-year term.
“Federal law requires employers to provide reasonable accommodations for pregnancy related restrictions unless it causes an undue hardship for the employer,” said Melinda C. Dugas, regional attorney for the EEOC’s Charlotte District, which covers North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia. She said the case underscores the need for employers to have policies, training and oversight so managers understand their accommodation duties.
What the law requires
The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act took effect June 27, 2023, and the EEOC’s regulation carrying it out took effect June 18, 2024. According to the agency, the law requires covered employers, including private employers with 15 or more workers, to provide reasonable accommodations for known limitations related to pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions unless doing so would cause an undue hardship.
The EEOC’s guidance says covered employers may not deny a job or other opportunities because a worker needs an accommodation, retaliate against a worker for requesting one, or require a worker to take leave if another reasonable accommodation would let the worker keep working. Separately, Title VII prohibits discrimination based on pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions.
For workers in physically demanding jobs such as meat processing, where lifting limits can matter directly, the case illustrates the type of request the law covers. The EEOC says more than 30 states and cities also have their own pregnancy accommodation laws, which can offer additional protection. Workers who believe they were denied an accommodation can file a charge with the EEOC.
Sources
- U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, “Smithfield Fresh Meats Corp. to Pay $245,000 in EEOC Pregnancy Discrimination Suit,” October 29, 2026. https://www.eeoc.gov/newsroom/smithfield-fresh-meats-corp-pay-245000-eeoc-pregnancy-discrimination-suit
- U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, “EEOC Sues Smithfield Fresh Meats Corp. for Pregnancy Discrimination,” August 19, 2025. https://www.eeoc.gov/newsroom/eeoc-sues-smithfield-fresh-meats-corp-pregnancy-discrimination
- U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, “What You Should Know About the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act,” accessed October 30, 2026. https://www.eeoc.gov/wysk/what-you-should-know-about-pregnant-workers-fairness-act
Featured photo: The Smithfield Foods pork processing plant in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, July 25, 2022. Representative image; not the Tar Heel, North Carolina, facility involved in the EEOC case. Photo: Tony Webster, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0). Cropped from the original.
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