On October 26, 2026, the Fifth Circuit issued a published opinion in Bien v. Union Pacific Railroad Company, No. 26-40061, reviving a former conductor’s Americans with Disabilities Act claim that the district court had dismissed as time-barred. The court held that the limitations period on his claim stayed paused while a nationwide class action against the railroad was pending, because a later, narrower class definition did not “unambiguously” exclude him.
James Bien lost his conductor job in 2013 after failing a color vision test and a follow-up field test. In 2015, Union Pacific mistakenly gave him another vision test, which he passed, but a review committee concluded the new result “does not negate or override” the earlier failure and denied reinstatement. Bien did not file his EEOC charge until April 2020. Meanwhile, in 2016, other employees had filed the Harris v. Union Pacific class action over fitness-for-duty evaluations, and in 2019 the Nebraska court certified a narrower class limited to employees “subject to a fitness-for-duty examination as a result of a reportable health event.” The Eastern District of Texas held that Bien fell outside the narrower class, so tolling ended in 2019 and his charge was late.
Writing for the panel, Judge Jerry Smith reversed. Under American Pipe tolling, tolling continues until a class definition unambiguously excludes the plaintiff, which the court said happens only in the “most straightforward, black-and-white, no-lawyer-required cases of exclusion.” Because Union Pacific had Bien take a vision test and then had a committee weigh it, the court found he plausibly was subjected to a “fitness-for-duty examination.” It rejected the railroad’s reliance on fine distinctions in its own Medical Rules, quoting the Eighth Circuit’s DeGeer decision that such wording changes are “fodder for lawyers and quicksand for laymen.” The court left open whether Bien properly exhausted his administrative remedies.
The takeaway for employers is that a pending class action can keep an old individual claim alive for years, and narrowing the class definition may not stop the clock unless the exclusion would be obvious to a non-lawyer. When evaluating a limitations defense, employers should check whether any class or collective action could have covered the employee, and should preserve separate defenses such as failure to exhaust.
A copy of the Fifth Circuit’s opinion in Bien v. Union Pacific Railroad Company is available here.
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