Flight attendant fired over expressing Catholic beliefs can proceed with lawsuit

By Matt McDonald

CNA Newsroom, Jul 11, 2025 / 18:00 pm

A Catholic flight attendant who says United Airlines fired him after he endorsed Catholic teachings on marriage and gender identity while talking with a co-worker can proceed with his lawsuit against his union for not standing up for him, a federal judge has ruled. 

The flight attendant, Ruben Sanchez, of Anchorage, Alaska, claims the airline investigated his extensive social media posts only after receiving what he describes as “baseless accusations” arising from a red-eye flight conversation in May of 2023 — and that when the company came up with nothing that violated its social media policy, it terminated him anyway. 

Sanchez filed the lawsuit in January of 2025 against United Airlines and the union he belonged to while working for the airline, the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. 

In court papers, he claims the airline violated his right to express his religious beliefs and discriminated against him because of his age, which was 52 at the time of the firing two years ago. He said had served as “a loyal United flight attendant” for almost 28 years. 

Sanchez’s complaint says that when he met with a United investigator online in June of 2023 to discuss the accusations against him, the investigator “reacted negatively when Sanchez explained the religious basis for his beliefs,” and that his union representative “did nothing to support him.” 

After United fired him, the union told Sanchez it would not represent him in arbitration unless he came up with the union’s portion of the cost and hired his own lawyer, according to court documents. 

In March of 2025, lawyers for the union filed a motion to dismiss the case, arguing that Sanchez’s complaint made “insufficient allegations of fact to plausibly suggest that the Union’s decision was covertly based on age or religious animus,” and that federal law governing fair representation by a union bars such a lawsuit. 

The union’s lawyers also argued that the union refused to represent Sanchez in arbitration because of “a lack of success in other cases in which flight attendants were fired related to their social media activities.” 

 

The judge disagreed with the union’s arguments for dismissal, saying that Sanchez presented sufficient evidence to pursue his claim that the union acted arbitrarily in not representing him in arbitration. 

Judge Christina Snyder, who was appointed by President Bill Clinton, also wrote in her decision, dated June 30, that Sanchez established a “prima facie case” that the union discriminated against him because of his age and religion — meaning that on first impression, his claim is plausible based on the evidence he has presented so far. The case would likely proceed toward a jury trial unless the union appeals the judge’s ruling or the parties settle. 

Lawyers for United Airlines have not responded to Sanchez’s claims in court filings so far. The judge has extended the deadline for doing so until Aug. 1. A spokesman for United Airlines contacted by CNA declined comment. 

CNA contacted a lawyer who is representing the union in the court case and a spokesman for the union but did not hear back by publication deadline. 

His case, meanwhile, has apparently caught the eye of officials at the social media giant X. 

 “Sanchez’s lawsuit is being supported by X Corp.,” Sanchez’s lawyers said in a written statement published Thursday on the law firm’s web site, referring to the company that owns the social media platform called X, previously known as Twitter from 2006 until July of 2023. A spokesman for X could not be reached for comment Friday.  

What did he do? 

Sanchez, who is also a member of the Alaska Air National Guard, was a last-minute replacement flight attendant on a red-eye flight from Los Angeles to Cleveland on May 30, 2023. To stay awake overnight he engaged in a quiet conversation with a fellow flight attendant, according to court papers. 

 “Sanchez and his colleague discussed their working conditions and everyday life. As they were both Catholic, their discussion turned to Catholic theology and then, with United’s ‘Pride Month’ activities set to start on June 1, Catholic teachings on marriage and sexuality,” Sanchez’s complaint states. 

A few days later, a user on what was then Twitter complained to the airline through its own Twitter account about Sanchez’s remarks, claiming that he overheard the two flight attendants during the flight – though Sanchez’s lawyers say in court papers that the unnamed person, who had sparred with Sanchez on social media before, was not on the flight. 

The Twitter user claimed that Sanchez “openly hates black people and is anti-trans,” according to court papers. 

During a subsequent meeting with an investigator from United, Sanchez denied making any racial comments, according to his complaint. Asked about an accusation that he is “anti-trans,” Sanchez “discussed his conversation with a co-worker during which they discussed Church teachings on marriage being between a man and a woman and that a person is unable to change his/her sex.” 

“Sanchez also noted that even though he is a gay male, he agrees with the Church’s teaching,” the complaint states, adding:  “The in-flight conversation was in low voices in the galley away from all passengers and no passenger reported any issues.” 

During a subsequent investigation of his social media posts, United highlighted 35 of more than 140,000 posts, “and accused Sanchez of lacking dignity, respect, professionalism, and responsibility on X when Sanchez was off-duty,” according to the complaint. 

But Sanchez’s complaint says United had never previously complained about his social media posts, which date back to 2010, even though several members of mid-level and senior management followed him online. 

Sanchez says in the complaint that he suspects his age was a factor in the firing because United prefers younger flight attendants and features them in its advertising and because “United has a history of targeting older flight attendants to terminate them for minor violations.” 

Sanchez also argues in court papers that United Airlines treated him differently from other employees, including firing him for personal social media posts stating his opinions on politics, social matters, and religion while retaining other United employees for more problematic social media posts, including a female flight attendant who chided some United customers as “drunks” who “drink like camels” and a female flight attendant who posted sexually provocative images of herself in a United uniform.

The flight attendant who posted images of herself was eventually fired, but only because she failed to delete a single image that depicted her in a United uniform, Sanchez’s complaint states.

“Sanchez was interrogated and investigated for his social media posts because of his age, religion, and political beliefs, while his co-workers who were younger or held different religious and political beliefs were not similarly,” Sanchez’s complaint states. 

“The termination of Sanchez’s employment served as an implicit warning and message to United’s other employees that the expression of views departing from liberal perspectives on race, political figures, the transgender movement, and public health issues would not be tolerated,” Sanchez’s lawyers wrote in the January complaint. 

Another case 

Sanchez says his case wasn’t the first time the union walked away from religious members who clashed with their employer over human sexuality. 

In May of 2022, two flight attendants who identify as Christian, Marley Brown and Lacey Smith, filed a lawsuit against Alaska Airlines and the union, saying they were fired for posting comments opposing the Equality Act, a bill filed in Congress in 2021 that sought to add sexual orientation and gender identity as protected classes in federal civil rights law and to limit religious-freedom defenses against claims arising from it. 

The airline had posted on an intra-company website its support for the Equality Act bill, and had invited employees to post their own comments on it, according to Brown and Smith’s subsequent lawsuit. But when the women posted comments challenging the bill and the company’s support for it, the company took down their comments and subsequently fired them, the lawsuit states. 

The union didn’t advocate for the women vigorously, according to the complaint. At one point, the complaint states, a union representative told Brown “that if she punched someone in the face on an airplane and it was captured on video, it would not be possible to offer much defense," likening her opposition to proposed legislation on religious grounds to physical assault. 

In May of 2024, Judge Barbara Jacobs Rothstein, who was appointed by President Jimmy Carter, dismissed the lawsuit. But the two women have appealed. 

Oral arguments in the Alaska Airlines case are scheduled for Friday, Aug. 22 at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in San Francisco. 

A spokesman for Alaska Airlines contacted by CNA declined comment.