Two women who lost their jobs at Twitter when billionaire Elon Musk took over have filed a federal lawsuit against the company, claiming that last month’s abrupt mass layoffs disproportionately affected female employees.
The discrimination lawsuit is the latest in a string of legal challenges stemming from Musk’s decimation of Twitter’s workforce via mass layoffs and firings.
On Nov. 4, just days after the world’s richest man paid $44 billion for the social media platform, the company informed about half of its employees that they no longer had a job but would receive three months of severance pay. The lawsuit, filed this week in federal court in San Francisco, claims that 57% of female employees were laid off, compared to less than half of men, despite Twitter employing more men overall prior to the layoffs.
Throughout November, Musk fired engineers who questioned or criticized him, and all remaining employees were given the option of resigning with severance or signing a form promising “extremely hardcore” work, long hours, and dedication to Twitter’s new direction. Hundreds more were laid off after refusing to make the pledge.
According to the lawsuit, this disproportionately harmed women, “who are more often caregivers for children and other family members, and thus are unable to comply with such demands.”
According to a filing with securities regulators, San Francisco-based Twitter began the year with approximately 7,500 employees worldwide. It is no longer a public company and has not disclosed how many employees remain. Twitter did not respond immediately to a request for comment on Thursday.
According to a spreadsheet, 57% of female employees were laid off on Nov. 4, compared to 47% of male employees, according to a lawsuit filed late Wednesday for former employees Carolina Bernal Strifling and Willow Wren Turkal on behalf of similarly situated female workers. On Thursday, the plaintiffs are scheduled to speak about the lawsuit.
According to the lawsuit filed by prominent Boston workers’ rights attorney Shannon Liss-Riordan, who ran an unsuccessful Democratic primary campaign for Massachusetts attorney general earlier this year, the gap is even wider for women in engineering-related roles — 63% were laid off, compared to 48% of men in engineering roles.
“The mass termination of employees at Twitter has had a much greater impact on female employees than male employees – and to a highly statistically significant degree,” Liss-Riordan wrote. “In addition, Elon Musk has made a number of publicly discriminatory remarks about women, confirming that the mass termination’s greater impact on female employees was the result of discrimination.”
Liss-Riordan stated outside the courthouse before a hearing that she wanted to demonstrate that “the richest man in the world is not above the law.”
“Musk and Twitter believe they will never be held accountable in court.” We contend that the arbitration agreements (signed by Twitter employees) are unenforceable. “However, if we have to go through arbirtration one by one, we are willing to do so,” Liss-Riordan said.
“Of all the issues confronting Elon Musk, this is the simplest to address: treat the workers with respect and pay them what the law requires,” she added.
The lawsuit is one of several examples of fired Twitter employees fighting back in the United States and elsewhere. One group of employees is suing in California for individual arbitration because the documents they signed when they joined the company waived their rights to a class action lawsuit and jury trial.
“We’ve filed five as of today,” their attorney Lisa Bloom said in an email Thursday. “The figure will continue to rise on a daily basis.”
A senior executive in Ireland is suing the company in court to reclaim her job after failing to respond to Musk’s email demanding that employees pledge to “extremely hardcore” work or resign with severance pay.
According to Irish media, Sinead McSweeney, Twitter’s global vice president for public policy, won a temporary injunction last week preventing Twitter from firing her. According to reports, the company told the Irish High Court that its human resources department intended to negotiate a settlement with McSweeney.
McSweeney stated in a sworn statement to the court that many employees at Twitter’s European headquarters in Dublin “expressed concerns and confusion” about Musk’s email.
McSweeney claimed she was forced to make a “completely artificial decision” that “placed me in an impossible, extraordinarily unfair, and unjust position” between accepting a “unilateral change” in her employment terms and being fired via a “sham resignation.”
She attempted to return to the Dublin office after her lawyers received assurances from Twitter that her employment was still valid, but her access pass did not work. Security stated that they would need to contact human resources to confirm she was still an employee.
“I felt completely humiliated, deeply confused, and was reduced to tears.