Emotional Distress Damages for Disability Bias on Tap at SCOTUS

The U.S. Supreme Court will clarify next term whether victims of disability discrimination under federal law can win emotional distress damages, after it granted review of a Fifth Circuit decision.

“Emotional distress” damages are intended to compensate people for intangible injuries, such as humiliation or embarrassment, that don’t have a readily assignable economic value.

The Fifth Circuit recently diverged from another federal appeals court over whether those damages are allowed in lawsuits brought for violating the antidiscrimination provisions of the Rehabilitation Act and the Affordable Care Act.

Contrary to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, the Eleventh ...