Evelyn Kayode v. Todd Blanche

── Evelyn Kayode v. Todd Blanche ── Court: Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Date: May 05, 2026 Category: General United States Court of Appeals FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT No. 25-5076 September Term, 2025 FILED ON: MAY 5, 2026 EVELYN KAYODE, APPELLANT v. TODD BLANCHE, APPELLEE Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Columbia (No. 1:22-cv-03802) Before: SRINIVASAN, Chief Judge, and HENDERSON and GARCIA, Circuit Judges. JUDGMENT This appeal was considered on the record from the United States District Court for the District of Columbia and on the briefs and oral argument of the parties. The panel has accorded the issues full consideration and has determined that they do not warrant a published opinion. See D.C. Cir. R. 36(d). It is hereby ORDERED AND ADJUDGED that the district court’s order granting summary judgment be AFFIRMED. I. Evelyn Kayode was a Special Agent in the Department of Justice’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) from December 2015 through November 2019. At OIG, Kayode worked on contract- and grant-fraud investigations in the Fraud Detection Office (FDO). Initially, her performance reviews were largely positive.  2 Kayode’s problems at the FDO began in 2016, when she alleges a coworker began harassing her and treating her rudely because she is a black woman of Nigerian origin. Kayode filed a discrimination complaint in May 2018, shortly after which she was reassigned to a new first-line supervisor, Amber Howell. Kayode was also supervised by Howell’s direct supervisor, Lewe Sessions. Soon after Kayode’s reassignment, Howell and Sessions began repeatedly raising concerns that she was not making timely progress on her investigations. That feedback was reflected in Kayode’s 2017 performance evaluation, which rated her performance as “successful” overall but noted timeliness as an area in which Kayode should improve. J.A. 617–20. Howell also identified problems with Kayode’s written work and eventually assigned her a writing coach. On November 28, 2018, Kayode got into a verbal altercation with Howell over her performance feedback, leading Howell to issue Kayode a letter of reprimand. Kayode’s deteriorating relationship with her supervisors caused her to develop anxiety that aggravated her hypertension and irritable bowel syndrome. Beginning in November 2018, Kayode submitted three formal requests for reasonable accommodation for her condition. Her first request, submitted on November 14, 2018, sought six weeks of telework. OIG approved that request. On January 9, 2019, Kayode submitted a second accommodation request for an additional eight weeks of telework and received a two-week extension of her prior accommodation while OIG reviewed the request. A few days later, Sessions emailed Kayode to express frustration that Kayode had missed deadlines for written reports and repeatedly failed to meet an established requirement during her telework period that she provide daily check-in emails detailing the work she completed. After receiving Sessions’ email, Kayode emailed several OIG officials stating that she was “unable to physically and mentally cope with work” and that she “would like to explore the opportunity of being reassigned to another office effective immediately.” J.A. 376. Kayode’s email caused OIG officials to refer her for a fitness-for-duty examination, including a psychological assessment. While her fitness was being assessed, Kayode was temporarily detailed to an administrative role in another branch in OIG’s Investigations Division. In April 2019, a clinical forensic psychologist evaluating Kayode’s fitn