A federal lawsuit is being brought against a Hampton Inn franchise in Craig, Colorado, alleging that the hotel fired non-Hispanic employees in favor of Latino’s. The lawsuit claims that the GM of the Colorado hotel was told by the owners “to hire more qualified maids, and that they preferred maids to be Hispanic because in their opinion Hispanics work harder.”
While the suit is being filed on behalf of three former employees of the hotel, the regional attorney for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, Mary Jo O’Neill, said that there may be more workers that faced this type of discrimination. She also noted that this is a very unusual case since minorities are usually the parties that bring these types of complaints. O’Neill said, “I’ve been doing this work for 30-some years and I’ve never filed a case like this.”
The lawsuit alleges that in a 4-month span, all non-Hispanic employees in laundry and housekeeping resigned or were fired and replaced with Latinos. The lawsuit is seeking to backpay and reinstatement for the employees that were fired.
