Yalda v. El Paso County Cmty College

Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 1 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit United States Court of Appeals ____________ Fifth Circuit FILED No. 26-50227 November 5, 2026 ____________ Thomas B. Plunkett, III Clerk Jacqueline Yalda, Plaintiff—Appellant, versus El Paso County Community College District, doing business as El Paso Community College, Defendant—Appellee. ______________________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas USDC No. 3:25-CV-295 ______________________________ Before Elrod, Chief Judge, and King and Stewart, Circuit Judges. Per Curiam: * This appeal presents the relatively uncommon circumstance of a plaintiff losing her case despite the defendant’s failure to appear in court. Plaintiff-Appellant Jacqueline Yalda sued her employer, Defendant-Appellee El Paso Community College District, in district court for alleged workplace sex discrimination and retaliation in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights _____________________ * This opinion is not designated for publication. See 5th Cir. R. 47.5. Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 2 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 Act of 1964. The employer failed to answer the complaint, so the Clerk entered default. Yalda immediately moved for default judgment. But then the district court held that Yalda’s complaint failed to state a claim for relief under Rule 8; it denied the motion while granting leave to amend the complaint. Yalda did not amend, so the district court dismissed her case. Yalda appeals the denial of default judgment and dismissal. And her employer now appears to oppose reversal. We conclude that Yalda’s complaint is indeed noncompliant with the Rule 8 pleading standard. Accordingly, we AFFIRM. I On August 4, 2025, Plaintiff-Appellant Jacqueline Yalda (“Yalda”) filed a complaint in the district court against Defendant-Appellee El Paso County Community College District, d/b/a El Paso Community College (“EPCC”). Yalda identifies herself as one of EPCC’s employees and states she was hired as a police officer in June of 2013. Her complaint states the following factual allegations accusing EPCC of unlawful workplace sex discrimination and retaliation in violation of Title VII. The first incident for which Yalda complains occurred in May of 2019. Yalda reported an incident of workplace sexual harassment directed at her work colleague Malaya Crum. Yalda does not go into details about the nature of the incident. Yalda does, however, state that she “ma[de] the report because [she] in good faith believe[d she wa]s reporting and complaining about sexual harassment in the workplace.” EPCC, after receiving Yalda’s report, allegedly prohibited Yalda from performing “off-duty work,” which is defined as working security at other locations. EPCC allows other police officers who are male or who have not complained about sexual harassment to perform off-duty work. Yalda, on the other hand, is “the only Police Officer that Employer EPCC does not allow to perform off-duty work.” She 2  Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 3 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 believes this prohibition was EPCC retaliating against Yalda for reporting sexual harassment, as well as discriminating against Yalda on the basis of her sex. A second incident occurred four years later. On or about August 24, 2023, Yalda made an in-person verbal complaint to EPCC Chief of Police Jose Ramirez (“Chief Ramirez”) and Police Lieutenant Michael Guzman (“Lieutenant Guzman”) about a sexual harassment incident. Yalda stated that her co-worker Officer Brandon Gutierrez approached another co-worker with whom Yalda was romantically involved and asked that co-worker to tell Gutierrez with whom they were engaging in sexual relations. Yalda also submitted a written report regarding that sensitive question to Chief Ramirez on August 25, 2023. EPCC Vice President of Student Enrollment Carlos Amaya (“VP Amaya”) received Yalda’s sexual harassment complaint on August 31, 2023. Yalda “in good faith believe[d] Gutierrez’s comments constitute[d] sexual harassment in the workplace against both [herself] and [her] co-worker.” VP Amaya informed Yalda on September 7, 2023, that her report had been addressed and resolved. But Yalda avers that EPCC took no action against Gutierrez to stop the harassment. 1 _____________________ 1 Although this allegation hints at the possibility of a hostile workplace claim, Yalda’s complaint only pleads sex discrimination and retaliation. Moreover, Yalda’s briefing presents only the district court’s supposed error in failing to recognize her claims for sex discrimination and retaliation. Our review on appeal focuses only on these two claims. See Elmen Holdings, L.L.C. v. Martin Marietta Materials, Inc., 86 F.4th 667, 674 (5th Cir. 2023) (“We rely on the parties to frame the issues for decision” and “normally decide only questions presented by the parties.” (citation modified)); Adams v. Unione Mediterranea Di Sicurta, 364 F.3d 646, 653 (5th Cir. 2004) (“Issues not raised or inadequately briefed on appeal are waived.”). 3 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 4 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 This was followed by a third incident. Yalda alleges that in September of 2023, EPCC Police Officer Edward Thomas falsely reported to the Employee Relations Department that Yalda had called another co-worker the n-word back in 2014. The Executive Director for Employee Relations and Compliance Audry Ortegon (“Director Ortegon”) promptly called Yalda into Director Ortegon’s office to inform her she had been reported. EPCC’s Human Resources department ultimately concluded in October 2023 that the accusation against Yalda was unsubstantiated. Yalda believes Director Ortegon and Thomas raised the false allegation because of Yalda’s sex and in retaliation for her August 2023 sexual harassment incident report. A fourth incident occurred several months later. Yalda alleges that on May 1, 2024, Gutierrez reported Yalda to their employer’s Title IX Coordinator. Gutierrez’s report accused Yalda of having called another co- worker the n-word in 2014. Gutierrez also stated in his report that he could corroborate Thomas’s 2023 report making the same accusation. Yalda alleges that the May 2024 false accusation against her was made because of her female sex and in retaliation for Yalda’s own August 2023 sexual harassment report against Gutierrez. Yalda alleges that the May 2024 report prompted EPCC to conduct another investigation into Yalda based on the false, discriminatory, and retaliatory accusations of both Thomas and Gutierrez. Yalda’s complaint does not state the ultimate findings of this second investigation. Finally, Yalda alleges a fifth incident occurred later in 2024. On or around August 14, 2024, Thomas approached Officer H. Gutierrez (a different person from Officer Brandon Gutierrez) and attempted to pressure H. Gutierrez to fabricate an accusation of racism against Yalda and report this to EPCC’s Employee Relations Department. H. Gutierrez, however, refused to do so. Instead, H. Gutierrez submitted a written report to Lieutenant 4 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 5 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 Guzman about Thomas’s attempt to procure a false workplace harassment report. Yalda alleges that since at least May of 2022—and definitively after her August 2023 sexual harassment report—EPCC has continued to discriminate and retaliate against Yalda by prohibiting her from performing off-duty work. In so prohibiting, EPCC treats Yalda differently from other police officers who are all male or who have not complained about sexual harassment. These two groups of individuals are allowed to do off-duty work. In fact, Yalda states that she is the only officer EPCC does not allow to perform off-duty work. Denying off-duty work has caused Yalda to miss out on additional income of $62,000.00 per year since May 2019. EPCC still prohibits Yalda from off-duty work to this day. Yalda’s complaint brought causes of action against EPCC for violations of Title VII, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq., alleging the employer discriminated against Yalda and retaliated against her. 2 She claimed damages that included lost wages and benefits, lost employment opportunities, lost income, and emotional pain and suffering. EPCC failed to answer the complaint, so the Clerk entered default on October 23, 2025. That same day, Yalda filed a motion for default judgment. Her motion requested $558,150.96 in damages. The district court, however, determined that Yalda’s complaint failed to state a claim for relief as required by Fed. R. Civ. P. 8 as to each and every cause of action she brought forth. The district court granted Yalda leave to amend within twenty days. But rather than file an amended complaint, Yalda filed a motion for _____________________ 2 Yalda attached a Notice of Right to Sue issued by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and certified she had met all the conditions precedent to filing her Title VII complaint. 5 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 6 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 reconsideration. The district court denied that motion. Once the amendment deadline passed without Yalda having filed an amended complaint, the district court entered final judgment dismissing the case with prejudice. Yalda timely appealed. EPCC, meanwhile, now appears and explains the summons served on it was inadvertently misfiled; this caused Defendant- Appellee’s failure to timely respond to the complaint. Nonetheless, EPCC encourages us to affirm the district court’s final judgment. II In general, “[w]e review a denial of a default judgment for abuse of discretion.” Clark v. City of Pasadena, 158 F.4th 653, 656 (5th Cir. 2025) (citing Lewis v. Lynn, 236 F.3d 766, 767 (5th Cir. 2001)). And we review a district court’s dismissal of a complaint for failure to state a claim under the de novo standard. Lindquist v. City of Pasadena, 525 F.3d 383, 386 (5th Cir. 2008). However, “decision[s] premised on an error of law constitute[] an abuse of discretion.” Escalante v. Lidge, 34 F.4th 486, 492 (5th Cir. 2022) (citation omitted). Here, the district court’s ground for denying default judgment was the complaint’s failure to plausibly state a claim. The determination that a complaint fails to state a claim is, ultimately, a “pure question of law.” Thompson v. Tex. Dep’t of Crim. Just., 67 F.4th 275, 279 (5th Cir. 2023); cf. Fernandez-Montes v. Allied Pilots Ass’n, 987 F.2d 278, 284 n.9 (5th Cir. 1993) (“The dismissal of a complaint under Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6) is a question of law[.]”). And because “a court abuses its discretion when it makes an error of law, we apply a de novo standard of review to such errors.” See O’Sullivan v. Countrywide Home Loans, Inc., 319 F.3d 732, 737 (5th Cir. 2003) (citing Stirman v. Exxon Corp., 280 F.3d 554, 561 (5th Cir. 2002)). The crux of this appeal is whether Yalda’s complaint states a claim. De novo review of that issue determines whether the district court abused its 6 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 7 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 discretion in denying default judgment. That issue is dispositive of whether the district court properly dismissed the complaint. With that clarified, we turn to evaluating the legal sufficiency of Yalda’s complaint. III A defendant who defaults admits as true all well-pleaded factual allegations in the complaint. Escalante, 34 F.4th at 492. The defendant, however, “is not held to admit facts that are not well-pleaded or to admit conclusions of law.” Id. at 492–93 (citation modified). If the well-pleaded, admitted allegations do not suffice to state a claim for relief, a court may still deny default judgment. Id. at 493. Even if the defendant defaults, the plaintiff’s complaint must comply with the Rule 8 pleading standard. Wooten v. McDonald Transit Assocs., Inc., 788 F.3d 490, 498 (5th Cir. 2015). A complaint must contain “a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2). The pleading standard “demands more than an unadorned, the-defendant- unlawfully-harmed-me accusation.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678, 129 S. Ct. 1937, 173 L. Ed. 2d 868 (2009) (citing Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555, 127 S. Ct. 1955, 167 L. Ed. 2d 929 (2007)). To meet the pleading standard, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter to state a claim for relief that is plausible on its face. Id. “Plausible” means the factual content of the complaint “allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged.” Id. “Factual allegations must be enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level, on the assumption that all the allegations in the complaint are true (even if doubtful in fact).” Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555 (citation modified). But courts “are not bound to accept as true a legal conclusion couched as a factual allegation.” Id. (citation modified). Indeed, “[t]hreadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere 7  Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 8 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 conclusory statements,” will not suffice to meet the pleading standard. Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678. Yalda raises two distinct causes of action against EPCC under Title VII. The first is for sex discrimination. The second is for retaliation. Yalda asserts that the district court improperly used the summary judgment standard, rather than the pleading standard, in holding that she failed to state a claim for relief for each of her claims. A We first address Yalda’s sex discrimination claim. Title VII makes it unlawful for an employer such as EPCC “to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise to discriminate against any individual with respect to his compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment, because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.” 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(a)(1). Yalda alleges that EPCC discriminated against, and continues to discriminate against, Yalda “because of her gender and protected activity” in reporting sexual harassment in the workplace “by prohibiting [Yalda] from doing off-duty work.” Her intentional discrimination claim is one for disparate treatment. 3 At the pleading stage, a plaintiff “need not make out a prima facia case of discrimination under McDonnell Douglas.” Cicalese, 924 F.3d at 766 _____________________ 3 Yalda’s complaint does not specify whether her discrimination claim is based on a theory of disparate treatment, disparate impact, or both. But the district court assumed she had made a disparate treatment claim. Yalda’s briefing does not contest that assumption. Moreover, her briefing cites caselaw discussing disparate treatment claims at the pleading stage and discusses her complaint based on only a disparate treatment theory. Yalda’s failure to mention disparate impact waives that issue, so we affirm the district court’s assumption and construe Yalda’s complaint as pleading only a disparate treatment theory of a Title VII discrimination claim. Cf. Cicalese v. Univ. of Tex. Med. Branch., 924 F.3d 762, 766 n.2 (5th Cir. 2019). 8 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 9 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 (citation modified). A district court errs if it requires a showing of each prong of the prima facie test for disparate treatment at the pleading stage. Id. Yalda’s view is that the district court did exactly that. A complaint need only “plead sufficient facts on all of the ultimate elements of a disparate treatment claim to make their case plausible.” Id. (emphasis in original) (citation modified). Therefore, for the purposes of Rule 8, factual support for the disparate treatment claim must show: (1) an adverse employment action that is (2) taken against Plaintiff-Appellant because of her protected status. Id. at 767 (citing Raj v. La. State Univ., 714 F.3d 322, 331 (5th Cir. 2013)). The district court relied on exactly this standard when it considered Yalda’s disparate treatment claim for plausibility. It focused on the two ultimate elements necessary at the pleading stage and cited Cicalese and Raj as the guideposts for its analysis. We disagree with Yalda’s contention that the district court relied on an incorrect standard. Even so, we must independently review the sufficiency of Yalda’s allegations. The first element requires Plaintiff-Appellant to identify an adverse employment action taken by the Defendant-Appellee. After this court’s holding in Hamilton v. Dallas County, a plaintiff “need only allege facts plausibly showing discrimination in hiring, firing, compensation, or in the terms, conditions, or privileges of his or her employment” to properly plead an adverse employment action. 79 F.4th 494, 502–03 (5th Cir. 2023) (en banc) (citation modified). The scope of activities that Title VII’s statutory text covers is quite broad. Id. at 503. As is relevant here, the phrase “terms, conditions, or privileges of employment” covers “more than terms and conditions in the narrow contractual sense.” Id. (citation modified). It includes, for example, the days and hours that one works. Id. at 505 (holding that employer’s alleged requirement that female officers work weekends, but 9 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 10 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 not male officers, is plausibly sex discrimination in terms, conditions, or privileges of employment). Here, we have no trouble holding that Yalda has plausibly pleaded an adverse employment action. She claims that EPCC does not allow her to perform off-duty work because of her protected status. Her complaint defines “off-duty work” as “working security at other locations.” Denying off-duty work causes Yalda to miss out on additional income of $62,000.00 per year since May 2019—extra income that her co-workers presumably can seek to earn. The location of where EPCC permits Yalda to work security clearly implicates the terms of her employment. Loss of additional income plausibly entails Yalda’s compensation, and indeed the privilege of even having the option to earn additional income through off-duty work. Yalda’s complaint sufficiently alleges facts meeting the first element of her disparate treatment claim. The second element requires Plaintiff-Appellant to plausibly show that the adverse action she was subjected to was because of her protected status. The words “because of” mean “by reason of” or “on account of” and incorporate the “simple and traditional standard of but-for causation.” Bostock v. Clayton Cnty., 590 U.S. 644, 656, 140 S. Ct. 1731, 207 L. Ed. 2d 218 (2020) (citation modified); E.E.O.C. v. Abercrombie & Fitch Stores, Inc., 575 U.S. 768, 773, 135 S. Ct. 2028, 192 L. Ed. 2d 35 (2015) (noting that Title VII relaxes the traditional but-for causation standard). “So long as the plaintiff’s sex was one but-for cause of that decision, that is enough to trigger the law.” Bostock, 590 U.S. at 656. A critical component of the second prong is showing discriminatory motive. See Pacheco v. Mineta, 448 F.3d 783, 787 (5th Cir. 2006). The complaint must allege facts, direct or circumstantial, that would suggest the employer’s adverse actions were based on the employee’s protected status 10 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 11 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 or that the employer treated similarly situated employees outside the protected class more favorably. Raj, 714 F.3d at 331. “If a plaintiff’s disparate treatment claim depends on circumstantial evidence, [they] will ultimately have to show that [they] can satisfy the McDonnell Douglas framework.” Cicalese, 924 F.3d at 767 (citation modified). In such a case, a court at the pleading stage may reference the framework in determining plausibility, so long as the court does not require pleading more than the ultimate elements of the claim. Id. Yalda’s complaint states that she was denied off-duty work because of her status as a female who reported sexual harassment in the workplace. As evidence of her disparate treatment compared to her peers, Yalda points out that EPCC allows other police officers who are male or who have not complained about sexual harassment 4 to work off-duty. The cognizable protected status at issue here is that of Yalda’s sex. Bostock, 590 U.S. at 656. We conclude that her complaint fails to plausibly allege that EPCC’s adverse actions were in any way motivated by her sex. _____________________ 4 To the extent Yalda pleads her complaining of workplace sex harassment as a protected status, that is not a class for the purposes of stating a disparate treatment claim. That purported membership group is not supported—or even mentioned—by the relevant statutory text, which lists only “race, color, religion, sex, or national origin” as protected groups. 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(a)(1). And at least one court that has confronted a pleading of an employee’s workplace complaint as a status itself has rejected construing that as a protected class. See Daniel v. Logoplaste, No. 3:25-cv-250, 2025 WL 2632402, at *7 (N.D. Tex. July 30, 2025) (holding that neither plaintiff’s “alleged status as a contract employee nor as a contract employee who complained about workplace safety counts as a statutorily- protected status” for disparate treatment claims), report and recommendation adopted, No. 3:25-cv-250, 2025 WL 2394084 (N.D. Tex. Aug. 18, 2025). Rather, the “status” of being someone who filed a sexual harassment grievance is more properly construed as a retaliation claim. Cf. Norsworthy v. Hous. Indep. Sch. Dist., 70 F.4th 332, 336 (5th Cir. 2023) (noting that filing a grievance may be “protected activity” for the purposes of pleading a retaliation claim). That is a wholly distinct concept from the disparate treatment analysis. 11 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 12 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 Yalda’s strongest—and indeed only—factual support is circumstantial evidence regarding male officers who can do off-duty work. But that does not nudge her disparate treatment claim toward plausibility. The district court rightly noted that circumstantial evidence can support an inference of discriminatory motive if there was some allegation that EPCC treated similarly situated co-workers outside the protected class more favorably. Raj, 714 F.3d at 331. But then it concluded that Yalda made no such allegation because she did not point to a male officer who also reported workplace sexual harassment. The district court’s focus on a nearly identical reporting is too narrow. Yalda alleged that Officers Edward Thomas and Brandon Gutierrez— male officers permitted to work off-duty—reported workplace racial harassment. Although the race-based reports were technically distinct from Yalda’s own sex-based reporting, both actions are nonetheless protected activity. Yalda and the two male officers were similarly situated in the sense that they all engaged in the protected activity of reporting alleged Title VII violations. These two technically distinct Title VII reports are similar enough for Yalda, Thomas, and Gutierrez to be considered similarly situated for purposes of analyzing EPCC’s alleged sex discrimination. Even so, other factual allegations undermine any causal inference of sex discrimination. Yalda mentions female co-workers in her complaint. She states she is the only officer not allowed to perform off-duty work. We can infer from these facts that EPCC allows Yalda’s female co-workers to work off-duty. This raises the possibility that EPCC’s adverse action has something to do with Yalda specifically, rather than being motivated by Yalda’s female status. Yalda does not “rule out [that] obvious alternative explanation” and nudge her claim “from conceivable to plausible.” Hikma Pharms. USA Inc. v. Amarin Pharma, Inc., 608 U.S. 580, 589–90, 146 S. Ct. 12 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 13 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 1391, 225 L. Ed. 2d 159 (2026) (citation modified). Under the most generous of readings, Yalda’s factual allegations are “merely consistent with [the] defendant’s liability.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (citation modified). A faithful application of the plausibility standard requires “further factual enhancement” to accept Yalda’s proffered inference of sex-based motive. Id. (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 557). Taking all the facts together, we cannot say EPCC’s decision to prohibit her from off-duty work was because of her sex. We ultimately agree with the district court’s conclusion that Yalda does not plausibly establish an essential element of her disparate treatment claim. The complaint does not state a claim for sex discrimination. Thus, the district court’s basis for denying default judgment was not an error of law. It did not abuse its discretion in denying default judgment as to this claim. Moreover, we affirm the dismissal with prejudice of Yalda’s sex discrimination claim for failure to meet the Rule 8 pleading standard. B Title VII also makes it unlawful for an employer such as EPCC to retaliate against an employee for engaging in activity protected by the statute. See 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-3(a). To state a retaliation claim under Title VII, the Plaintiff-Appellant must show that (1) she engaged in conduct protected by Title VII; (2) she suffered a materially adverse action; and (3) a causal connection exists between the protected activity and the adverse action. Jenkins v. City of San Antonio Fire Dep’t, 784 F.3d 263, 269 (5th Cir. 2015). Yalda’s retaliation claim boils down to EPCC’s alleged response to Yalda’s two workplace sexual harassment reports. She alleges that after she reported in 2019 that her co-worker experienced workplace harassment, EPCC barred Yalda from doing off-duty work. She concludes this was an act of retaliation for her report. And when Yalda reported a second sexual harassment incident directed at herself in 2023, EPCC again retaliated 13 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 14 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 against her by continuing to prohibit off-duty work. Neither of these plausibly states a claim for retaliation. The first allegation regarding Yalda’s 2019 report fails to plausibly establish the first element of a retaliation claim. At the pleading stage, a plaintiff can establish she engaged in protected activity under Title VII by plausibly showing she either: “(1) opposed any practice made an unlawful employment practice by Title VII or (2) made a charge, testified, assisted, or participated in any manner in an investigation, proceeding, or hearing under Title VII.” See Long v. Eastfield Coll., 88 F.3d 300, 304 (5th Cir. 1996) (citation modified). “[A] vague complaint, without any reference to an unlawful employment practice under Title VII, does not constitute protected activity.” Paske v. Fitzgerald, 785 F.3d 977, 986 (5th Cir. 2015) (quoting Davis v. Dall. Indep. Sch. Dist., 448 F. App’x 485, 493 (5th Cir. 2011)). Yalda’s 2019 report simply declares that her co-worker was sexually harassed and that Yalda had a “good faith” belief this was violative of Title VII. The claim that she made the report in 2019 is a factual allegation. But the claim that the alleged incident constituted sexual harassment is a legal conclusion. We will not simply take Yalda at her word on that. Yalda must, at the very least, proffer some facts showing there was a reasonable basis to believe the incident may have violated Title VII. See E.E.O.C. v. Rite Way Serv., Inc., 819 F.3d 235, 237–38 (5th Cir. 2016) (citing Payne v. McLemore’s Wholesale & Retail Stores, 654 F.2d 1130, 1140 (5th Cir. Unit A Sept. 1981)). This, she does not do. Yalda’s grievance to EPCC is just the sort of vague, conclusory allegation that disentitles her to the pleading-stage presumption of truth. The second allegation fails both the first and third elements. Yalda states that she was at one point in a romantic relationship with a co-worker. Based on the factual allegations, in August 2023 Officer Gutierrez asked the 14 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 15 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 implicated co-worker to identify with whom they were having sexual relations. Yalda took offense to this single inquiry and reported it as sexual harassment to EPCC. The facts here, once again, do not establish a reasonable basis for believing the incident may have violated Title VII’s prohibition of sex-based harassment. A single question about with whom one is romantically involved may not exactly be an expression of professional courtesy, but it does not rise to the level of harassment all on its own. See, e.g., Cuellar v. Sw. Gen. Emerg. Physicians, P.L.L.C., 656 F. App’x 707, 710 (5th Cir. 2016) (“[A]n isolated comment generally cannot support a Title VII sexual harassment claim.”); Harris v. Forklift Sys. Inc., 510 U.S. 17, 21, 114 S. Ct. 367, 126 L. Ed. 2d 295 (1993) (“[M]ere utterance of an epithet which engenders offensive feelings in an employee does not sufficiently affect the conditions of employment to implicate Title VII.” (citation modified)). Indeed, a “recurring point” in Title VII caselaw is that “simple teasing, offhand comments, and isolated incidents (unless extremely serious) will not amount to discriminatory changes in the terms and conditions of employment.” Faragher v. City of Boca Raton, 524 U.S. 775, 788, 118 S. Ct. 2275, 141 L. Ed. 2d 662 (1998) (citation modified). The pleaded facts do not suggest Gutierrez even knew the other party was Yalda, or that there was any ill intent behind the question. And it does not appear that Yalda was present when Gutierrez posed the question. The overall context provided by the factually sparse pleadings does not plausibly suggest a practice made unlawful by Title VII. As to the third element, we find it difficult to infer any causal connection between Yalda’s 2023 harassment report and her bar from off- duty work beginning in 2019. It makes little sense to claim EPCC retaliated for Yalda’s 2023 grievance when its supposed adverse action began four years prior. Even if we construe this as retaliation in the form of continuing a prior adverse action, the odd sequencing of events diminishes the plausibility of 15 Case: 26-50227 Document: 56-1 Page: 16 Date Filed: 11/05/2026 No. 26-50227 Yalda’s retaliation claim. Cf. Swanson v. Gen. Servs. Admin., 110 F.3d 1180, 1188 (5th Cir. 1997) (holding that close timing between protected activity and adverse employment action may be sufficient to establish a causal connection). Nothing else in Yalda’s complaint plausibly alleges a claim for retaliation either. Yalda alleges that her co-workers Officers Thomas and Gutierrez retaliated against her by fabricating reports to EPCC that Yalda engaged in racial discrimination back in 2014. But these allegations do not state a plausible claim that EPCC retaliated against Yalda either. “The actions of ordinary employees are not imputable to their employer unless they are conducted ‘in furtherance of the employer’s business.’” Hernandez v. Yellow Transp., Inc., 670 F.3d 644, 657 (5th Cir. 2012) (quoting Long, 88 F.3d at 306). There must be “a direct relationship between the allegedly [retaliatory] conduct and the employer’s business.” Id. (quoting Long, 88 F.3d at 306). Yalda’s complaint makes no factual allegations that would plausibly suggest Thomas’s and Gutierrez’s conduct is imputable to EPCC. In sum, none of Yalda’s factual allegations plausibly establish essential elements of her retaliation claim. We can only conclude that the district court did not commit an error of law in denying default judgment for failure to comply with Rule 8. The district court acted within its discretion. It also properly dismissed with prejudice Yalda’s retaliation claim against EPCC. 5 IV Poverty of factual allegations doomed Yalda’s complaint. She had no basis in law for obtaining a default judgment. We AFFIRM. _____________________ 5 We also affirm the district court’s choice to dismiss with prejudice because the district court gave Yalda the opportunity to amend, but Yalda chose not to do so. 16