"recruit, procure, refer, or place employees" who are not already in an established
employment relationship. RCW 49.60.040(12). Moreover, the Court of Appeals
has persuasively applied precedent from the Supreme Court ofthe United States to
hold that '"[a]n employment action is adverse if it is harmful to the point that it
would dissuade a reasonable employee from making complaints of sexual
harassment or retaliation.'" Boyd v. State, 187 Wn. App. 1,15, 349 P.3d 864
(2015)(citing Burlington N. & Santa Fe Ry. Co. v. White, 548 U.S. 53, 68, 126 S.
Ct. 2405, 165 L. Ed. 2d 345 (2006)). If prospective employers are allowed to
engage in retaliatory refusals to hire, a reasonable employee might well be
dissuaded from opposing discriminatory practices for fear of being unofficially
"blacklisted" by prospective future employers.
15
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Jin Zhu V. ESD 171, No. 94209-9
BSD ITl's interpretation is further undermined by WLAD's statutory
structure. Since the time that WLAD was first enacted, it has included the
provisions now codified at RCW 49.60.180-.200 and .210. Those provisions have
always maintained the same basic form, and they have always been set forth in the
same order. Compare RCW 49.60.ISO-.210, with LAWS OF 1949, ch. 183 § 7(1)-
(4).
First, RCW 49.60.180 defines practices by employers that are unfair when
based on a person's protected characteristics, including refusing to hire the person,
discharging the person, discriminating against the person in the terms and
conditions of employment, and inquiring into the person's protected characteristics
in the hiring process.
Second, RCW 49.60.190 defines practices by labor unions that are unfair