Key Points

  • The First Circuit affirmed the denial of summary judgment on qualified immunity to three Puerto Rico Senate officials sued by three former employees who allege they were fired for their partisan affiliation.
  • Applying its 2026 precedent, the court held that the 2022 order confirming the Commonwealth's PROMESA Plan of Adjustment did not discharge the employees' personal-capacity damages claims.
  • The court held that the district court erred as a matter of law in relying on whether the officials themselves examined the employees' job duties, because the qualified-immunity test is objective.
  • The court nonetheless affirmed because the officials did not develop an argument that, even on the employees' version of the facts, a reasonable official could have deemed the positions unprotected; their formal-job-description argument was waived.
  • The court held it had appellate jurisdiction under Johnson v. Jones over the purely legal questions but not over challenges to the district court's factual premises.

A federal appeals court on Tuesday refused to end damages claims against three top officials of Puerto Rico's Senate by former staff members who say they were fired for their party affiliation. The court rejected both the officials' bid for qualified immunity and their argument that the Commonwealth's bankruptcy plan had wiped out the claims.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit affirmed a trial judge's refusal to grant the officials summary judgment. Chief Judge Barron wrote for the panel, which included Circuit Judge Thompson and retired Supreme Court Justice Stephen G. Breyer, sitting by designation. The panel found that the trial judge had used the wrong legal test on one of two grounds but upheld the ruling because the officials had not adequately challenged the other.

The decision lets the three former employees keep pursuing claims for money from the officials personally, rather than from the government. It also applies the First Circuit's recent holding that the plan confirmed in Puerto Rico's bankruptcy proceedings does not reach such personal-capacity claims. And it holds that whether officials looked into an employee's duties before a firing plays no part in deciding whether they are immune.

Qualified immunity, in the court's words quoting an earlier First Circuit decision, "safeguards even unconstitutional conduct if a reasonable officer at the time and under the circumstances surrounding the action could have viewed it as lawful."

Dozens of former Senate employees filed the underlying suit in December 2017 against Senate President Thomas Rivera-Schatz; Roberto Maldonado-Vélez, the Senate's administrative secretary; and Gabriel Hernández-Rodríguez, Rivera-Schatz's chief of staff. The appeal concerned only the First Amendment damages claims of three employees: Elizabeth Colón-Rodríguez, a protocol officer in the Senate's Office of Protocol and Activities, and Pierre Vega-Alameda and Horidel Pons-Anaya, liaison technicians in its Office of Governmental Affairs.

Under First Circuit precedent, the First Amendment bars firing public employees for their politics unless their jobs "involve government decisionmaking on issues where there is room for political disagreement on goals or their implementation." The three employees argued that their jobs did not.

U.S. District Judge William G. Young of the District of Massachusetts, sitting by designation in Puerto Rico, denied the officials' motion for two independent reasons. First, he found genuine factual disputes over "exactly what duties these plaintiffs performed," drawing on both official job descriptions and the employees' testimony. Second, he found disputes over whether the officials themselves had considered the employees' duties before having them removed. A reasonable official, Judge Young wrote, "must at least inquire as to the nature of the duties of the position based upon the history of political discrimination cases in Puerto Rico."

While the appeal was pending, the officials argued that the claims had been discharged in the Commonwealth's bankruptcy proceedings under the Puerto Rico Oversight, Management, and Economic Stability Act, known as PROMESA. Citing a 2022 order confirming the Commonwealth's Plan of Adjustment, they asked for a remand with orders to "dismiss or permanently stay the action."

"We may easily dispose of the defendants' PROMESA-related contention," Chief Judge Barron wrote. He cited the circuit's 2026 holding that the confirmation order "does not apply to personal-capacity claims and that such claims are therefore not subject to any injunction impeding their prosecution." Discharging such claims, that decision had said, "would constitute a non-consensual third-party release," contrary to the plan's language and to the Supreme Court's reasoning in Harrington v. Purdue Pharma L.P. "Thus, the claims at issue in this interlocutory appeal clearly were not discharged," the panel held.

The employees argued that the appeals court lacked jurisdiction under Johnson v. Jones, a 1995 Supreme Court decision that bars officials from immediately appealing a trial court's finding that factual disputes require a trial. The panel held that it could still review purely legal questions.

On the first of those questions, the officials argued that Judge Young had imported "a subjective diligence standard into the qualified immunity framework." The panel agreed. It noted that Judge Young had relied on a 2008 dissent by Judge Torruella in an earlier patronage case, López-Quiñones v. Puerto Rico National Guard. The majority in that case had held that the immunity test "is not subjective" and instead turns on what a reasonable official would have thought. It had assessed the fired employees' duties for itself, the panel noted, rather than asking how the officials came to understand them.

"As a result, we agree with the defendants that the existence of genuine issues of material fact about whether the defendants themselves considered the nature of the plaintiffs' job duties has no bearing on whether the defendants are entitled to qualified immunity," Chief Judge Barron wrote.

Judge Young's other ground remained. The officials contended that even on the employees' version of the facts, a reasonable official could have believed the firings were lawful. The panel held that the officials had to explain why, and had not. Their assertion about Colón-Rodríguez's job, Chief Judge Barron wrote, "fails to engage with the District Court's reasoning, which, as noted above, rested in part on testimony about the plaintiffs' job duties and not merely formal job descriptions." Their broader claim that immunity applies whenever reasonable officials could disagree, he wrote, "sets forth a conclusion rather than an argument."

The officials also pointed to Colón-Rodríguez's formal job description, which said she exercised "initiative and personal judgment." They cited First Circuit precedent that "what counts are the attributes inherent in the position." But they never explained why the formal description alone should control, the panel held. It ruled that argument "waived for lack of development."

The employees were represented by Eduardo A. Vera Ramírez, who argued the appeal. Solicitor General of Puerto Rico Omar Andino-Figueroa represented the Senate officials.

The affirmance returns the three employees' claims to the district court, where the disputes Judge Young identified over what their jobs involved remain unresolved.