Disability Discrimination Lawyer in New York City

Learn More About Your Rights

Three laws can apply to a disability claim in New York, and they do not protect workers equally.

• The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) applies to employers with 15 or more employees and protects a qualified individual who can perform the essential functions of a job with or without a reasonable accommodation.
• The New York State Human Rights Law (NYSHRL) reaches further. Since February 2020, it covers every employer in the state regardless of size, defines disability more broadly than federal law, and expressly protects workers who request an accommodation.
• The New York City Human Rights Law (NYCHRL) is the most protective. It covers employers with four or more employees, defines disability the most broadly of the three, and puts much of the burden on the employer to show that you could not do the job or that an accommodation would be an undue hardship.

Across all three laws, employers may not treat applicants or employees adversely because of a disability. Qualified workers and applicants may also be entitled to reasonable accommodations depending on the circumstances.

More conditions qualify than most people expect. 

Under the ADA, you are protected if you have a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits a major life activity, such as walking, seeing, hearing, concentrating, or the function of a major bodily system, if you have a record of one, or if your employer regards you as having one. New York State and City law go further, covering essentially any medically diagnosable physical, mental, or medical impairment without requiring proof that it substantially limits daily life.

Commonly covered conditions include: 

• Cancer, including cancer in remission
• Diabetes
• Heart conditions
• HIV and AIDS
• Epilepsy and other neurological conditions
• Back and spinal injuries
• Carpal tunnel syndrome
• Depression, anxiety, PTSD, and ADHD

Temporary and episodic conditions can also qualify, particularly under city law.

You are protected whether a disability is current, in your past, or only perceived, and you are protected if you are treated adversely because of your relationship to someone with a disability. Pregnancy-related complications can qualify, too, and these cases often overlap with pregnancy discrimination claims.

It rarely comes with an employer admitting that a medical condition drove the decision. Many claims build through a series of actions that begin after the employer learns about a disability, a treatment plan, an accommodation request, or a need for leave. 

Common forms include:

• Refusing to hire or promote a qualified applicant or employee because of a disclosed or perceived disability.
• Firing or disciplining someone after they request time off for treatment, or after they return from medical leave.
• Denying a reasonable request for remote work, schedule changes, breaks, or modified duties without a real review.
• Stripping responsibilities, accounts, or advancement after a diagnosis or leave.
• Treating a worker as incapable based on assumptions rather than actual performance.
• Refusing to engage in a cooperative dialogue about possible accommodations.
• Harassment based on a physical, mental, or psychological condition.
• Acting against a worker because a family member has a disability.
• Retaliating against someone for requesting an accommodation or reporting discrimination.

A diagnosis alone does not decide a claim. What usually matters is what the employer knew, how you were treated, whether you could do the job with an accommodation, and whether the employer handled the request fairly.

Yes.  Many employees think disability discrimination only involves a termination, denied promotion, or refused accommodation. In reality, disability-related harassment can also create a hostile work environment.

Examples may include repeated comments, mocking, stereotypes, offensive nicknames, or conduct directed at an employee because of a physical, medical, or mental-health condition. This could include coworkers repeatedly referring to an employee with a mobility impairment by derogatory nicknames, making jokes about a worker's medical condition, questioning whether someone is "crazy" because they sought mental-health treatment, or repeatedly mocking an employee's physical limitations.

A hostile work environment may develop when disability-related comments, jokes, ridicule, exclusion, or other conduct become part of the workplace culture. The analysis often focuses on the frequency of the conduct, who participated, whether management knew about it, and how the employer responded after learning about the problem.

No. The same laws that protect employees protect qualified job applicants. An employer breaks the law when it screens you out based on assumptions that a disability will cause absences, raise costs, or limit productivity, instead of judging whether you can perform the essential functions of the job with a reasonable accommodation.

The ADA also limits what an employer can ask. Before making a job offer, an employer generally cannot ask questions likely to reveal a disability or require a medical exam. 

Questions that cross the line include:

• Do you have a disability?
• What medical conditions do you have, or what medications do you take?
• Have you ever filed a workers' compensation claim?
• How many sick days did you use at your last job?
• Have you been treated for a mental-health condition?
• Will your condition require frequent medical appointments?

An employer may ask whether you can perform the job and how you would do it, with or without an accommodation. You can also request an accommodation to complete an application or interview fairly. After a conditional offer, an employer has more room to ask medical questions or require an exam, but only if it treats everyone entering the same job category the same way, and any decision to pull the offer has to be genuinely job-related.

Hiring bias is hard to spot because employers rarely admit it. The timing of questions, a change in tone after a disclosure, and inconsistencies in the employer's explanation often become the evidence.

A reasonable accommodation is a change to the application process, workplace, schedule, or the usual way a job is done that lets a qualified person with a disability do the work. 

Depending on the job, it can include:

• A modified or flexible schedule, or adjusted start and end times.
• Leave for treatment, recovery, or medical appointments.
• Remote or hybrid work.
• Additional or adjusted breaks.
• Accessible facilities, modified equipment, or assistive technology.
• Modified training materials or testing procedures.
• Reassignment to a vacant position or adjustment of non-essential duties.

Your employer does not have to grant your exact request if a different accommodation would work just as well, and it does not have to provide one that would cause an undue hardship based on cost, disruption, and its resources. A minor expense does not qualify. A flat refusal without any individualized review, though, is often a warning sign.

Cooperative Dialogue Requirement in New York City

New York City law requires more from employers than federal or state law does. When you request an accommodation, or when the employer otherwise has notice that you may need one, it must engage in a cooperative dialogue, a good-faith conversation about your needs, the possible accommodations, any alternatives, and any difficulty an accommodation might create. The discussion can happen in person or in writing.

At the end, the employer must give you a written final decision identifying the accommodation it granted or denied. Ignoring a request, stalling indefinitely, or rejecting it without that process can itself be a violation of the city law, separate from the underlying discrimination.

Many disabilities are not obvious. Mental-health conditions, chronic illnesses, autoimmune and neurological conditions, cancer treatment, and conditions that flare up and subside can all affect your work without being visible to a supervisor.

New York City law is especially broad here. Temporary and short-term conditions can qualify, and you can be protected even when treatment keeps your symptoms under control. You are also protected when an employer wrongly assumes you have a disability, for example, by pulling responsibilities or denying an opportunity based on a mistaken belief that you can no longer handle the work after a diagnosis or leave.

Many employees hesitate to disclose medical conditions because they fear stigma, retaliation, damage to their careers, or concerns about how coworkers and supervisors will respond. Delayed disclosure is common and does not automatically weaken a disability discrimination claim.

Sometimes. This is called associational disability discrimination, and it can arise when an employer treats you differently because of the disability of a spouse, child, or someone else close to you. An employer might raise concerns about your attendance, commitment, or health-insurance costs, or move to discipline, pass over, or fire you after learning that a family member has a serious condition.

Federal and local protections can apply, though the rules for associational claims and the rules for accommodations are not the same. These cases benefit from a careful review of what the employer said and what changed afterward.

Your employer is the primary target of a claim, but under both the New York State and New York City Human Rights Laws, an individual, such as a supervisor or manager who took part in the discrimination or aided and abetted it, can be named personally alongside the company. That can matter both for accountability and for the value of a case.

Many disability discrimination cases involve workplace power dynamics rather than a simple disagreement about accommodations. Supervisors, executives, business owners, physicians, law firm partners, managers, and other individuals with authority over schedules, compensation, assignments, promotions, evaluations, or continued employment often control decisions that directly affect an employee's career.

Employees may hesitate to disclose a medical condition or request accommodations because they fear retaliation, damage to their professional reputation, loss of advancement opportunities, or increased scrutiny. In many cases, disability discrimination claims arise not from the condition itself, but from how decision-makers react after learning about a diagnosis, treatment plan, accommodation request, or medical leave.

Understanding who held authority, how that authority was exercised, and what changed after a disclosure or accommodation request is often central to evaluating a disability discrimination claim.

No. It is unlawful to retaliate against you for requesting an accommodation, reporting disability discrimination, or taking part in an investigation. New York State law now expressly protects workers who ask for a reasonable accommodation, and federal and city law protect this activity as well.

Retaliation can take the form of termination, demotion, reduced hours or responsibilities, sudden negative reviews, heightened scrutiny, exclusion, or pressure to resign. Timing is often the tell. A strong record followed by sudden criticism shortly after a disclosure or an accommodation request, with an explanation that does not fit your history, can point to retaliation.

Many disability discrimination and accommodation cases do not involve an employer openly admitting bias. Instead, the issue is often what changes after the employer learns about a medical condition, accommodation request, need for treatment, or protected leave.

Employees frequently tell us that everything seemed fine until they disclosed a diagnosis, requested an accommodation, needed surgery, began cancer treatment, sought mental-health treatment, or requested medical leave. They may have years of positive performance reviews, strong evaluations, promotions, or no history of discipline. Then, shortly after the disclosure, they are suddenly placed under heightened scrutiny, denied opportunities, disciplined, demoted, or terminated.

One of the first things employment lawyers often examine is timing. The temporal relationship between a disability disclosure, accommodation request, medical leave, or protected activity and a subsequent adverse employment action can become important evidence. While timing alone does not prove discrimination, a sudden change in treatment immediately after an employer learns of a medical condition may raise important questions about the employer's motives.

Phillips & Associates frequently analyzes accommodation requests, medical leave records, performance reviews, internal communications, and personnel records to determine what changed, when it changed, and whether the employer's explanation is consistent with the employee's history.

Recovery depends on the facts and on which law applies, and New York and New York City law tend to offer more than federal law. 

Remedies can include:

• Back pay and lost benefits, plus front pay for future losses.
• Compensatory damages for emotional distress and other harm. The ADA caps these by employer size; New York State and City law do not.
• Punitive damages where the employer's conduct was egregious or reckless.
• Attorney's fees and costs.
• Reinstatement, accommodations, or other changes going forward.

Claims brought through the New York City Commission on Human Rights can also carry civil penalties against the employer.

You connect an adverse decision to your disability and undercut the employer's stated reason. These cases usually rest on the full employment record rather than one document. 

Helpful evidence includes:

• Emails, texts, and chat messages, and any comments made during hiring.
• Your accommodation requests and the employer's response.
• HR complaints, performance reviews, and disciplinary records from before and after the issue arose.
• Job descriptions, schedules, leave records, and offer or rejection letters.
• How comparable coworkers were treated.

Preserve records you lawfully have access to, and do not take confidential or proprietary materials unrelated to your claim. Employers rarely admit to bias. They tend to argue performance, business needs, that you were not qualified, that an accommodation was an undue hardship, or that you posed a direct safety threat. Those defenses are tested against the timing and the documentation, and gaps in the story become part of your case.

Many disability discrimination cases are proven through workplace records and digital communications rather than direct admissions. Evidence may include emails, text messages, Microsoft Teams communications, Slack messages, accommodation requests, HR records, performance reviews, calendar entries, scheduling records, and internal discussions regarding leave or workplace restrictions.

In many matters, no single document proves discrimination. Instead, the evidence creates a timeline showing what changed after an employee disclosed a medical condition, requested an accommodation, took protected leave, or returned to work.

Metadata and electronic records can also be important. Information showing when communications were sent, edited, preserved, or deleted may help establish timing and reveal inconsistencies in an employer's explanation.

Disability discrimination cases frequently involve discovery disputes, electronic evidence preservation, accommodation records, witness development, deposition testimony, motion practice, summary judgment proceedings, and trial preparation. The strongest cases are often built through careful evidence development rather than a single document or witness.

Phillips & Associates has handled more than 9,500 employment matters, litigated approximately 2,000 cases, and recovered more than $360 million for employees. The firm prepares cases for negotiation, mediation, discovery, trial, and appeal, with dedicated litigation teams focused exclusively on employment law.

A few steps protect both you and any future claim:

• Put accommodation requests in writing and keep the employer's response.
• Keep dated notes of decisions, conversations, and witnesses, and save relevant messages on a personal account.
• Report the discrimination through your employer's process where it makes sense. An internal complaint can build a record, though it is not a legal prerequisite to getting advice or filing a claim, and HR works for the employer, not for you.
• Do not sign a severance agreement or release without having it reviewed first.
• Talk to an employment lawyer before resigning, since quitting can affect both your claim and your finances.

Deadlines turn on which law and forum you use, and a missed one can end a strong case.

• Under the NYSHRL, you generally have three years, both in court and, for conduct on or after February 15, 2024, for a complaint with the New York State Division of Human Rights.
• Under the NYCHRL, you have three years to sue in court. A complaint with the New York City Commission on Human Rights generally must be filed within one year, and you usually cannot pursue the same claim in both places.
• Federal ADA claims run through the EEOC, where you generally have 300 days to file a charge in New York.

A denied accommodation, a hiring decision, discipline, and a termination can each start their own clock, so it is worth speaking with an attorney as soon as possible. Acting sooner also preserves evidence and witness memory.

Phillips & Associates is an employment-only litigation firm focused on workplace power dynamics, career-impacting employment disputes, and misconduct by people in positions of authority. The firm has handled more than 9,500 employment matters, litigated approximately 2,000 cases, and recovered more than $360 million for employees.

The firm's attorneys have appeared before more than 110 United States District Judges and more than 70 United States Magistrate Judges, including a verified presence before nearly all federal district judges currently sitting in the Southern District of New York and Eastern District of New York. Phillips & Associates has obtained published decisions in the Second Circuit, federal district courts, and New York state courts interpreting discrimination, retaliation, hostile work environment, accommodation, and Human Rights Law claims.

Many disability discrimination matters involve workplace power dynamics rather than simple disagreements about accommodations. The firm's cases frequently involve supervisors, executives, business owners, physicians, law firm partners, managers, and other individuals who control compensation, schedules, assignments, promotions, evaluations, or continued employment. Understanding how authority operates inside organizations is often central to evaluating disability discrimination, accommodation, medical leave, and retaliation claims.

Phillips & Associates is built around senior-led legal teams with long-standing continuity. Each client is assigned a dedicated legal team led by a partner or senior litigator, with attorneys and paralegals working together in-house from intake through resolution. The firm prepares matters for negotiation, mediation, discovery, motion practice, trial, and appeal.

Every member of the firm receives trauma-informed training. Phillips & Associates combines litigation experience, practical judgment, and human understanding to help employees navigate disability discrimination, accommodation disputes, medical leave issues, and other workplace challenges with clarity and confidence.

Speak with Our Disability Discrimination Attorneys in NYC

If a disability cost you a job, a promotion, or an accommodation you needed, you have rights under federal, state, and city law, and you do not have to enforce them alone. At Phillips & Associates, PLLC, we represent employees and job applicants only, focus entirely on employment law, and handle these cases on contingency. Consultations are free and confidential, and there is no fee unless we recover for you.

Call (866) 229-9441to speak with a New York disability discrimination lawyer. We serve clients throughout NYC and New York State.