A federal judge told city lawyers she is “very, very troubled” by their handling of a class-action lawsuit alleging New York City discriminates against gay male employees seeking IVF benefits.
U.S. District Judge Jeannette Vargas made that assessment after nearly two years of what plaintiffs describe as stonewalling, missed deadlines, and repeated violations of court orders by the city’s Law Department. The judge went further, encouraging the plaintiffs to seek sanctions against city lawyers, according to court transcripts.
The suit, filed in May 2024, centers on a straightforward discrimination claim. The city’s health plan covers in vitro fertilization for men and women in straight relationships, women in same-sex relationships, and single women. Gay male employees and their partners get nothing. The plan requires employees to be deemed “infertile” to qualify for IVF benefits, a definition that structurally excludes men in same-sex relationships no matter their medical history.
Gay men have one realistic path to biological parenthood. That path runs through IVF with a surrogate mother, a process that costs tens of thousands of dollars without insurance coverage.
“Over 2,000 gay male city employees and their spouses have been unlawfully denied an equal opportunity to receive IVF benefits in the City’s health insurance plans due to their sexual orientation,” attorney Peter Romer-Friedman said in a statement.
The named plaintiffs are Corey Briskin, who worked as an assistant district attorney in Manhattan from 2017 until 2022, and his husband Nicholas Maggipinto. They sued after the city turned down their IVF claim. Their case has grown into a class action on behalf of more than 2,000 gay male city workers and their spouses.
In court papers, Romer-Friedman spelled out what he described as a sustained pattern of obstruction. City lawyers declined to share information and evidence with Briskin’s attorneys. They racked up legal missteps across nearly two years of litigation. “Defendants cannot simply wish away their multiple serious violations of clear Court orders,” Romer-Friedman wrote, pointing to the city’s “complete failure to refute any of these facts.”
The suit’s own language is blunt about the city’s awareness of its obligations. “The City of New York and its leaders have long known that they have an obligation not to discriminate against gay men under federal, state, and local law, but they have disregarded that obligation when it comes to offering IVF benefits to City employees,” it says.
The city’s response has been muted. Nicholas Paolucci, a spokesperson for the Law Department, said Corporation Counsel Steve Banks is “committed to reviewing all pending cases at the Law Department, which we are doing.” Paolucci also told reporters, “We take our discovery obligations seriously and are working diligently to meet the court’s deadlines.”
That’s a careful answer. Paolucci didn’t respond when asked whether a lawyer shortage inside the department contributed to the delays.
That question has teeth. The City has reported that former Mayor Eric Adams moved to fill Law Department vacancies with pro bono lawyers after he took office in 2022, a workaround that itself pointed to chronic staffing problems at the agency responsible for defending the city in federal court.
Judge Vargas now has the sanctions question in front of her. If she grants them, the city faces direct financial and legal consequences on top of an already difficult discrimination case. The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York has broad authority to impose sanctions for discovery violations, including orders that certain facts be deemed admitted or that the offending party pay opposing counsel’s fees.
What the city can’t easily walk back is the structure of the benefit itself. The infertility requirement, as written, doesn’t just disadvantage gay male employees. It makes it impossible for them to qualify. That’s the kind of facially discriminatory policy that tends to fare poorly in federal court, regardless of how the discovery fight resolves.
Advocates have flagged this disparity for years. The Human Rights Campaign and other LGBTQ+ organizations have long pushed public employers to overhaul benefit structures that treat same-sex couples as a category apart when it comes to family formation support.
For Briskin and Maggipinto, and for the 2,000-plus workers the suit represents, the case comes down to something direct. The city offers a benefit. It won’t let them use it. And so far, its lawyers can’t seem to explain why.