Full Opinion

USCA11 Case: 25-13734 Document: 26-1 Date Filed: 10/20/2026 Page: 1 of 6 NOT FOR PUBLICATION In the United States Court of Appeals For the Eleventh Circuit ____________________ No. 25-13734 Non-Argument Calendar ____________________ JULIE HOLLAND, an individual, Plaintiff-Appellant, versus 3M COMPANY, Defendant-Appellee. ____________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia D.C. Docket No. 1:23-cv-00856-TRJ ____________________ Before JILL PRYOR, NEWSOM, and BRANCH, Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM: Julie Holland sued her former employer, 3M Company, al- leging religious discrimination in violation of Title VII. The district USCA11 Case: 25-13734 Document: 26-1 Date Filed: 10/20/2026 Page: 2 of 6 2 Opinion of the Court 25-13734 court entered summary judgment for 3M, finding no conflict be- tween Holland’s alleged religious beliefs and 3M’s policies. On ap- peal, Holland argues that the district court erred because her reli- gious beliefs are indeed incompatible with 3M’s policies. After careful review, we affirm. I Before she was terminated, Holland worked in 3M’s Health Care Business Group. That job required her to visit major hospital systems at least monthly. Then COVID-19 hit. 3M responded to the crisis—and to the federal government’s vaccine mandate for healthcare workers—by requiring vaccination for all 3M employ- ees in healthcare roles (like Holland) who visited clients covered by the federal vaccine mandate (like major hospital systems). Holland requested an exemption from 3M’s policy, asserting that her reli- gious beliefs prevented her from vaccinating against COVID-19. 3M denied her request and ultimately fired her for refusing to com- ply with company policy. Holland sued 3M alleging religious discrimination in viola- tion of Title VII. According to Holland, 3M’s vaccination policy violated her Christian beliefs because “after prayer and reflection,” “God had expressly forbidden her from taking the vaccine.” Br. of Appellant at 3. 1 1 In her complaint, Holland asserted that 3M’s policy also conflicted with her religious opposition to abortion, because “all COVID-19 vaccines have made use either in production or testing of fetal cell lines developed from tissues derived from aborted fetuses.” Compl. at 6, Dkt. No. 1 (citation modified). USCA11 Case: 25-13734 Document: 26-1 Date Filed: 10/20/2026 Page: 3 of 6 25-13734 Opinion of the Court 3 Following discovery, 3M moved for summary judgment, ar- guing that Holland had not made out a prima facie case of religious discrimination because she had not shown that her religious beliefs conflicted with its vaccine policy. In her deposition testimony, Holland contended that 3M’s policy conflicted with her religious beliefs in two specific ways: First, she expressed religious opposi- tion to mRNA vaccines out of concern that they would alter her DNA, “which is [her] design from God.” Holland’s Dep. Test. at 57, 74–75, Dkt. No. 48-1. Second, she asserted that forced compli- ance with 3M’s policy would violate her God-given free will. See Summ. J. Order at 7, Dkt. No. 59 (quoting Holland’s Dep. Test. at 75). According to 3M, neither of those beliefs actually conflicted with its policy. For one thing, 3M’s policy permitted covered em- ployees to take Johnson & Johnson’s non-mRNA vaccine. And alt- hough Holland asserted a religious objection to “medical interven- tion that [she] do[es] not wish to have,” Holland’s Dep. Test. at 75, she also conceded—under oath—that she would have no religious objections to a mandatory flu vaccine, even though she does not wish to have the flu vaccine, either, id. at 102–03. Finding insuffi- cient support in the record for Holland’s assertion that her religious views conflict with 3M’s vaccination policy, the district court en- tered summary judgment for 3M. Summ. J. Order at 6–7. But she later retreated from that position, explaining that (1) her religious op- position to vaccination was not related to the use of fetal cell lines in the vac- cine-development process, Holland’s Dep. Test. at 176–77, Dkt. No. 48-1, and (2) she hadn’t expressed that objection to 3M, id. at 177. USCA11 Case: 25-13734 Document: 26-1 Date Filed: 10/20/2026 Page: 4 of 6 4 Opinion of the Court 25-13734 II We review a district court’s grant of summary judgment de novo. Ismael v. Roundtree, 161 F.4th 752, 758 (11th Cir. 2025). In doing so, we view all evidence and factual inferences reasonably drawn from the evidence in the light most favorable to the non-moving party. Id. A court may grant summary judgment “if the movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Id. (quoting Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a)). There is no genuine issue of material fact if the record can’t reasonably be read to support the nonmoving party’s assertions. Id. Generally, we “accept the nonmovant’s version of the events when reviewing a decision on summary judgment.” Evans v. Stephens, 407 F.3d 1272, 1278 (11th Cir. 2005) (en banc). But we have “consistently held that conclusory allegations without specific supporting facts have no probative value.” See Evers v. Gen. Motors Corp., 770 F.2d 984, 986 (11th Cir. 1985) (holding conclusory testi- mony was insufficient to defeat summary judgment). And, im- portantly, we can’t cherry-pick helpful lines from a non-movant’s testimony—and ignore the unhelpful ones—even if she asks us to. See Evans, 407 F.3d at 1278 (explaining that a court may not “pick and choose” evidence to “string together those portions of the rec- ord to form the story that [it] deem[s] most helpful to the non- movant”). All this to say, we must take Holland at her own word. USCA11 Case: 25-13734 Document: 26-1 Date Filed: 10/20/2026 Page: 5 of 6 25-13734 Opinion of the Court 5 III On appeal, Holland argues that the district court erred in finding that she had not made out a prima facie case of religious discrimination under Title VII. Title VII prohibits religious dis- crimination by employers against their employees. 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(a)(1). As a threshold matter, a Title VII plaintiff must show that her sincerely held religious belief conflicted with one of her employer’s requirements. Id.; see also Bailey v. Metro Ambulance Servs. Inc., 992 F.3d 1265, 1275 (11th Cir. 2021). The district court held that Holland’s Title VII religious-discrimination claim could not survive summary judgment because Holland’s own statements show that there is no real conflict between her religious views and 3M’s COVID-19 policy. We agree. In her deposition, Holland stated that she had only two problems with the policy. Holland’s Dep. Test. at 75 (“Q: Okay. Anything else about the vaccines that violates your religious beliefs? A: No.”). Holland’s first religious objection—that mRNA vaccines could alter her DNA—presents no conflict with 3M’s pol- icy requiring covered employees to take any of several COVID-19 vaccines, including Johnson & Johnson’s non-mRNA version. And Holland’s second objection—that employer-mandated medical in- terventions violate her God-given free will to the extent that she opposes the intervention—is belied by her own statements that she would have no religious objection to a forced flu vaccine, even though she opposes that vaccine, too. Holland’s Dep. Test. at 102– 03. Although Holland has attempted to retreat from her conces- sions in her appellate briefing, she is bound by the sworn testimony USCA11 Case: 25-13734 Document: 26-1 Date Filed: 10/20/2026 Page: 6 of 6 6 Opinion of the Court 25-13734 she provided in her deposition, even at the summary judgment phase. See Evans, 407 F.3d at 1278 (11th Cir. 2005) (“[T]he courts owe a nonmovant no duty to disbelieve his sworn testimony.”). Because neither of the two religious beliefs Holland asserted conflicts with 3M’s policy, Holland has not made the threshold showing that Title VII requires. Bailey, 992 F.3d at 1275. Accord- ingly, the district court did not err in granting summary judgment to 3M. 2 AFFIRMED. 2 Holland also argues that the district court erred in finding that accommodat- ing Holland’s religious beliefs would work an undue hardship on the com- pany. To be sure, if Holland had made the prima facie case of religious dis- crimination that Title VII requires, then 3M would bear the burden of showing that it could not accommodate her beliefs without undue hardship. See Bailey v. Metro Ambulance Serv. Inc., 992 F.3d 1265, 1275 (11th Cir. 2021). But because we conclude that Holland hasn’t carried her initial burden, we need not—in- deed, must not—go any further. See PDK Labs., Inc. v. U.S. DEA, 362 F.3d 786, 799 (D.C. Cir. 2004) (Roberts, J., concurring in part and concurring in judg- ment) (“[I]f it is not necessary to decide more, it is necessary not to decide more.”).