Apple will pay a former Reston store employee $150,000 after the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission accused the tech giant of allowing a manager to make antisemitic comments and fire a Jewish worker who asked for time off to observe the Sabbath.

The settlement, disclosed in a court filing in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia on Aug. 8, resolves a lawsuit the EEOC filed in September 2025, Reuters reported. The consent decree states Apple "denied these allegations but agreed to resolve the lawsuit."

Tyler Steele worked at Apple's Reston retail location starting in 2007 as an "Apple Genius" providing technical support. He converted to Judaism in 2023 and asked to avoid shifts on Fridays and Saturdays to observe the Jewish Sabbath, which runs from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday.

A new manager hired that year denied those requests, according to the EEOC. The agency alleged the manager told Steele he smelled like body odor and warned him not to discuss the October 2023 Hamas attack on Israel with coworkers. Steele complained to Apple twice.

Nothing changed, the EEOC said.

Apple fired Steele in January 2024, days after he refused a request to work on a Friday. The company attributed the termination to violations of its grooming policy. The EEOC called the firing discriminatory and retaliatory.

The $150,000 payment breaks down as $80,000 in back pay and $70,000 in compensatory damages and interest, according to Calcalist.

Under a two-year consent decree, Apple must provide at least 1.5 hours of Title VII compliance training to HR teams, store management and employees who handle religious accommodation requests in its Northern Virginia retail operations, HR Dive reported. The company must also update its religious observance policy.

The case is EEOC v. Apple, No. 1:25-cv-01637. Neither Apple nor the EEOC commented publicly on the settlement.

For the next two years, Apple must report any denials of religious accommodation requests and any religious discrimination complaints to the EEOC at retail locations where the manager in question works.