(Ken Silva, Headline USA) A former Justice Department lawyer has sued the DOJ for racial discrimination, alleging that she was passed over for promotions and removed from her leadership position because she’s a Caucasian female.
The lawsuit was filed last week in Illinois federal court by Mary Gorecki, a 57-year-old lawyer who worked for the DOJ’s Community Relations service from 2010 to 2023. Gorecki previously was the first female to be elected as State’s Attorney for Kane County, Illinois. She was also the first white female regional director in CRS history.
Gorecki said her troubles started in 2022, when the Senate confirmed Paul Monteiro to lead the CRS. Since then, Monteiro has removed white women from leadership positions, replacing them with African Americans and other people of color, she said.
A white female prosecutor went absolutely nuclear on the DOJ in a civil rights lawsuit last week — alleging sweeping anti-white racism within the department.
Mary Gorecki names names, and talks shit about the black colleagues she says she's more qualified than. pic.twitter.com/TDWND53NVy
— Ken Silva (@JD_Cashless) November 15, 2024
“Mr. Monteiro filled leadership positions, particularly those of Regional Directors, with only African Americans … By December 2022, seven months after Mr. Monteiro returned to CRS, no white woman served in a leadership capacity at CRS,” she said, adding, “Ms. Gorecki’s Regional Director position was given to three African Americans.”
Gorecki said she was the highest performing Regional Director in CRS. Despite that, Monteiro forced her out of her position in August 2022—doing so by placing her in a newly created position of “Disability and Environmental Justice subject matter expert.”
Gorecki said the newly created position was, in fact, a demotion designed to remove her from her regional directorship. She further explained that she was not suited for the new position since she had little experience with disabilities or environmental justice.
“Mr. Monteiro stripped Ms. Gorecki of her supervisory duties, removed all support for Ms. Gorecki, eliminated her from leadership meetings … and removed her as the lead for working groups and committees,” her lawsuit said.
“The SME Program Manger position was a fake position designed to remove Ms. Gorecki as Regional Director, to harass her, and to conceal the true illegal, discriminatory motives behind Ms. Gorecki’s illegal reassignment from Regional Director to program manager,” the lawsuit later added.
Monteiro replaced Gorecki with an African American named Synthia Taylor, despite Taylor not even having a law degree, according to the lawsuit.
Once Taylor took Gorecki’s job, she allegedly became tyrannical—ordering Gorecki to do administrative tasks and other menial chores.
CONFIRMED: Paul Monteiro, to be Director of DOJ’s Community Relations Service, known as "America's Peacemaker." As our country faces an inflection point where building bridges of understanding is critical, having the first Senate-confirmed CRS Director since 2012 is imperative. pic.twitter.com/tWATqk2tIJ
— Senate Judiciary Committee (@JudiciaryDems) April 29, 2022
“Ms. Taylor ordered Ms. Gorecki to perform records management work such as cleaning and shredding, and data entry … None of these tasks had anything to do with the artificially created position of EJ and Disability program manager. They were demeaning, demoralizing and well below Ms. Gorecki’s GS-15 pay grade,” her lawsuit said.
Gorecki apparently has a history with Monteiro, who resigned as CRS director in April 2023. Under the Obama administration, for example, he allegedly tried to remove her from regional directorship for another fake position, that one the CRS’s “Muslim and Sikh subject matter expert”—even though she was neither Muslim nor Sikh.
At that time, the Office of Special Counsel intervened and restored her to her position in September 2016. But Gorecki said she had to file a lawsuit in court last week because all of her administrative remedies within the DOJ had been exhausted. She further claimed that she suffered retaliation for filing an internal complaint about the discrimination.
Gorecki cites numerous other instances of discrimination in her 30-page complaint.
The former prosecutor is alleging that the DOJ committed numerous Civil Rights Act violations, including discrimination based on race, age and gender.
She seeks reinstatement to her position as CRS regional director, as well as compensation and damages.
The DOJ has yet to respond to her lawsuit, which was first reported by CourtWatch.news.
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at x.com/jd_cashless.
