A hearing officer and a former administrative law judge are each suing the Iowa Department of Education for alleged employment discrimination.

Randy Reiter, who was hired by the Department of Education 46 years ago at age 22, is suing the department in Polk County District Court, alleging age discrimination and gender-based pay discrimination.

State records indicate that for Reiter’s final 25 years of his employment, he worked for the department’s Disability Determination Services Bureau as an administrative law judge presiding over contested hearings dealing with claims for Social Security disability benefits.

In 2019, an assistant bureau chief with the department began repeatedly asking Reiter when he was going to retire. In late 2017, the department allegedly promoted a female disability examiner specialist, Ellen McComas, to fill a vacant position as a disability hearing officer – a job that is largely the same as an administrative law judge.

In December 2020, McComas allegedly complained that because of her gender she was being paid less than Reiter for doing the same job. A short time later, according to the lawsuit, the bureau notified Reiter that even though his duties would remain the same, the department intended to reclassify his position as “examiner specialist advanced” in order to cut his pay by more than $45,000 annually.

When Reiter asked Administrator of Vocational Rehabilitation David Mitchell why he was being demoted, Mitchell allegedly replied that the...

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