Drug Testing

Employers in Washington state can fire employees who fail a drug test, even if they have a valid recommendation to use medical marijuana, the state Supreme Court ruled Thursday. The ruling came in the case of a Bremerton woman who was fired from her job after testing positive for pot, although she had a recommendation to use marijuana for migraine headaches.

In the case, Jane Roe v. TeleTech Customer Care Management, the anonymous plaintiff was pulled out of a training class and fired in October 2006 because she failed a pre-employment drug test. Her attorney argued that the Washington state medical marijuana law implicitly required employers to accommodate medical marijuana use outside the workplace.

But in an 8-1 decision, the state Supreme Court disagreed. The majority noted that the state law explicitly allows employers to forbid on-the-job medical marijuana use, but says nothing about medical marijuana use outside the workplace.

"We hold that [the Washington Medical Use of Marijuana Act] does not provide a private cause of action for discharge of an employee who uses medical marijuana, either expressly or impliedly, nor does MUMA create a clear public policy that would support a claim for wrongful discharge in violation of such a policy," wrote Justice Charles Wiggins for the majority.

But in his dissent, Justice Tom Roberts noted that under the medical marijuana law, qualified patients "shall not be penalized in any manner, or denied any right or privilege, for such actions." Roberts added that, "Roe seems to be exactly the sort of person the people intended to protect... Neither I nor the law would require employers to employ drug impaired workers. The law is intended to treat marijuana like any other medication."

If the state high court will not protect the rights of Roe, Roberts wrote, the legislature should step up and do so. "To that end, I urge the legislature to thoughtfully review and improve the act."

But that's no easy process. In California, which has seen a similar state court ruling gutting the employment rights of medical marijuana users, a legislative effort to provide a fix died in Sacramento last week.

The ACLU of Florida Tuesday filed suit in federal court in Miami to block Gov. Rick Scott's (R) executive order mandating random, suspicionless drug testing of state employees. The lawsuit contends the drug testing amounts to an unlawful and unreasonable search and seizure, violating state employees' Fourth Amendment rights, and seeks an immediate halt to the practice.

"We are taking this action to prevent Gov. Scott from trampling on your rights in Florida," said ACLU of Florida head Howard Simon during a Wednesday afternoon press call. "We don't have a system of government run only by the executive and the legislative branch. It's time for the courts to step up and defend the rights of Floridians. This is an abuse of government power."

The lawsuit was brought on behalf of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Council 79, which represents 50,000 state employees and an additional 200,000 county and municipal employees in Florida. Also joining the lawsuit is Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission research scientist Richard Flamm.

"AFSCME has for decades supported drug-free workplace policies while preserving the fundamental right of public servants to be free of extreme governmental intrusions," said Alma Gonzales, general counsel for AFSCME Council 79. "We negotiated objective standards for drug testing for reasonable suspicion or if there is a safety risk, but at no point has the governor's office ever contacted us to negotiate over this. We're talking about taking their bodily fluids without probable cause or consent," she pointed out. "It's surprising and disappointing that the chief executive of Florida is unaware or doesn't care that this is the law of the land."

"I've been a state employee for almost 18 years," said Flamm. "There is absolutely no suspicion based on my behavior at work that I am a drug user. I joined as a plaintiff in this lawsuit because I find this extremely costly and wasteful. There is no threat to society. As a Florida taxpayer, I find it outrageous that given our current economic climate, with the loss of services and public jobs, that we would be wasting millions with unnecessary drug tests. As a citizen of the United States, I find this executive order an egregious attack on the Constitution. I'm surprised more people haven't stepped up," the research scientist said.

Scott signed the executive order on March 22, and it called for state agencies to have devised drug testing regimes by May 21, but it is unclear whether any state employees have been subjected to drug testing at this point.

The US Supreme Court has held that suspicionless drug testing by the government is an unreasonable search under the Fourth Amendment. The only exceptions allowed by the high court are "special circumstances," such as employees who work in jobs where there is "concrete danger of real harm."

"This executive order is profoundly un-American," said Simon. "This is a governor who masquerades as a conservative, but who is a radical. We had a revolution in this country that led to the enactment of the Fourth Amendment and the bill of rights, and that was a reaction to warrantless searches by the troops of King George."

"When we were asked to look at this and represent AFSCME, we did a painstaking analysis of constitutional law precedents dealing with employee drug testing," said Peter Walsh, an ACLU of Florida attorney working on the case. "This isn't a case of a governor arguably acting within the bounds of the US Constitution or even pushing the envelope to test the limits; the governor has ripped the envelope apart and jumped way over the line of what is permissible. He has violated the Fourth Amendment's search and seizure clause and done so in a big way."

There is also precedent from the Sunshine State itself. The city of Hollywood, Florida, enacted a municipal employee drug testing law little more than a decade ago, only to have it thrown out by the Florida courts in 2000. Four years later, the state Department of Juvenile Justice's effort to conduct suspicionless drug tests on employees was also thrown out. The department is a state agency covered by the governor's executive order.

"I'm not surprised but a little bit shocked that the governor would go ahead with issuing an executive order when this is about as close to settled law as possible," said Simon. "Federal judges have struck such programs down as searches without probable cause and without reasonable suspicion."

"Employee drug testing by urinalysis is particularly destructive of privacy, offensive to personal dignity, demeaning and an affront to dignity," said Walsh. "Those are the words of Justice Antonin Scalia from his dissenting opinion in a seminal case on employee drug testing."

In that case, the high court upheld suspicionless drug testing by private employers. US law provides few worker protections from employer drug testing. But drug testing by the government is a different matter, and constitutional protections unavailable to private sector workers come into play.

"People say this is so widespread in the private sector that what's the big deal," said Simon. "But just because it's widespread doesn't make it right. Public sector employees are protected by the Fourth Amendment; they have more protection of their rights to privacy. We are proud to be filing this lawsuit on their behalf."

Simon also hinted strongly that the ACLU of Florida would soon be filing another lawsuit, this one aimed at the welfare drug testing bill Gov. Scott signed this week. Like state worker drug testing, the courts have frowned on the suspicionless drug testing of welfare recipients. The last state to try to implement such a plan, Michigan, had its law thrown out as unconstitutional by a US district court in 2003.

Gov. Scott ran on a platform of reducing needless spending in the public sector. But he's about to spend big bucks on defending an executive order that is constitutionally indefensible and likely to spend even more defending the welfare drug testing law that is just as constitutionally indefensible.

Florida welfare applicants and recipients, mostly women with children, will now have to undergo drug tests at their own expense to receive cash benefits after Gov. Rick Scott (R) signed into law a drug testing bill, HB 353, that passed the state legislature earlier this month. Scott also signed HB 1039, a law banning "bath salts," or new synthetic stimulant drugs.

More than 21,000 Floridians receiving benefits as heads of households will have to pay for and take the drug tests, as well as any new applicants. If they pass the drug test, they will be reimbursed for the cost. If they fail the drug test, they become ineligible to receive benefits for one year or until successfully completing drug treatment. Children of heads of household who test positive would still be eligible to receive benefits through a designated third party.

Scott and the Republican-controlled legislature argued that the law is necessary to stop welfare recipients from using the money to buy drugs. But opponents cited studies demonstrating that drug use is no more common among welfare recipients than among the general public.

"While there are certainly legitimate needs for public assistance, it is unfair for Florida taxpayers to subsidize drug addiction," Scott said in a press release. "This new law will encourage personal accountability and will help to prevent the misuse of tax dollars."

The ACLU of Florida was quick to attack the new law. It noted that the only other state law mandating suspicionless drug testing of welfare recipients -- one in Michigan -- was overturned by the federal courts in 2003 for violating the Fourth Amendment's proscription against unwarranted searches and seizures.

"Once again, this governor has demonstrated his dismissal of both the law and the right of Floridians to personal privacy by signing into law a bill that treats those who have lost their jobs like suspected criminals," said ACLU of Florida head Howard Simon in a statement Tuesday. "The wasteful program created by this law subjects Floridians who are impacted by the economic downturn, as well as their families, to a humiliating search of their urine and body fluids without cause or even suspicion of drug abuse."

Citing the Michigan decision, Simon continued: "Surely the governor knew this, and the ACLU testified in the legislature that the bill was a significant and unnecessary invasion of privacy. The new law rests on an ugly stereotype that was disproven by the state's own earlier experimental drug-testing program," he said. "Nevertheless, their zeal to score political points on the backs of Florida's poor once again overrode their duty to uphold the Constitution. Searching the bodily fluids of those in need of assistance is a scientifically, fiscally, and constitutionally unsound policy. Today, that unsound policy is Florida law."

Wednesday the ACLU of Florida announced it was filing suit against the governor over an executive order he issued earlier this year requiring suspicionless drug testing of state employees. At the same time, it promises an announcement soon about how it plans to respond to the welfare drug testing law. 

A bill requiring Florida welfare recipients to undergo drug tests passed the state Senate last Thursday. A similar measure has already passed the House. The bill was supported by Gov. Rick Scott (R), who is expected to sign it into law shortly.

"It’s fair to taxpayers," Scott said after the vote. "They're paying the bill. And they're often drug screened for their jobs. On top of that, it's good for families. It creates another reason why people will think again before using drugs, which as you know is just a significant issue in our state."

Scott has already signed an executive order mandating drug tests for state workers. But Republican senators this week fended off bipartisan amendments that would have imposed drug tests for anyone working for a company that receives public funds and schoolchildren in the Bright Futures program. Those amendments were designed to sabotage the bill by spreading the net uncomfortably wide.

If Scott signs the bill into law, it is almost certain to face a constitutional challenge, and the challengers would have a strong case. The only other state to pass a suspicionless drug testing bill for welfare recipients, Michigan, saw its law thrown out by a federal appeals court in 2003 as an unconstitutional violation of the Fourth Amendment's protection against warrantless searches. Arizona has a welfare drug testing law, but that law requires probable cause before a drug test can be demanded.

The bill, House Bill 353, requires all adult applicants for or existing recipients of federal cash benefits -- the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program -- to undergo drug testing at their own expense. If they pass the drug test, the cost of the test is reimbursed by the state. The tests would screen for all controlled substances and recipients would have to disclose any legal prescriptions they have.

If recipients test positive, they lose their benefits for a year. If they fail a second test, they lose their benefits for three years. Children whose parents lose their benefits could still receive benefits if another adult is designated the payee on their behalf.

The bill is set to go into effect July 1, provided Gov. Scott actually signs it and no legal challenge has been filed by that date.