The U.S. federal government has sued Bloomberg LP, accusing the news and financial-services company of discrimination against women who became pregnant and took maternity leave, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission alleged the New York company demoted and reduced the pay of three women after they announced they were pregnant. The suit seeks relief for a broader class of female employees affected by the alleged practices.

The suit is part of an initiative begun last year by the EEOC to file bigger-impact suits against alleged "systemic" discrimination in the workplace, and it also fits into the agency's new focus this year on mistreatment of "workers with care-giving responsibilities," according to Elizabeth Grossman, the EEOC's regional attorney in New York, who filed the case.

Systemic refers to a practice or policy rather than an isolated act of discrimination. The suit seeks monetary relief as well as the formation of pregnancy-friendly policies and programs.

The complaint alleges that Bloomberg reduced female employees' job responsibilities, excluded them from management meetings and replaced them with more-junior male employees after they announced they were pregnant and upon returning from maternity leave, according to the report.