NEW YORK, US – SEPTEMBER 17: Elon Musk arrives on the Turkish House to fulfill with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ahead of the 78th session of the United Nations (UN) General Assembly in Latest York, United States on September 17, 2023. (Photo by Fatih Aktas/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
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Elon Musk’s X broke the law in firing an worker who criticized management’s return-to-work policy, the National Labor Relations Board alleged, in its first formal grievance against the corporate formally often known as Twitter.
The NLRB’s “Region 20” San Francisco branch on Friday claimed that X violated the National Labor Relations Act by terminating Yao Yue, a principal software engineer, shortly after Musk took over in late October. The NLRB alleged that X fired Yu after she attempted to arrange other Twitter staff who were upset about Musk’s sudden change to the corporate’s work requirements.
CNBC reported that Musk sent emails to Twitter employees detailing his expectations, going thus far as to say “any manager who falsely claims that somebody reporting to them is doing excellent work or that a given role is important, whether distant or not, will probably be exited from the corporate.”
“For those who can physically make it to an office and you do not show up, resignation accepted,” Musk said, in response to the NLRB. That led several staff to specific “concern and outrage” over the directive to return to the office immediately, in response to the unique legal charge document that was filed in March.
Yue then tweeted, “Don’t resign, let him fire you. You gain literally nothing out of resignation.” She also posted in an organization Slack channel a message saying, “Do not be fired. Seriously.”
Lots of Yue’s colleagues responded to her messages, in response to the legal charge document. Meanwhile, Musk also directed his management team to scan any online posts and Slack “as a way to discover who ought to be fired,” the document said.
Five days later, Yue was fired and told that she was violating an unspecified company policy, the legal document said.
“Ms. Yue alleges that Twitter selected her for layoff in retaliation for her attempt to arrange her co-workers to not resign, in order that they would have higher legal footing to challenge any separation from Twitter,” the document said.
The NLRB alleges that X has “been interfering with, restraining, and coercing employees within the exercise of the rights guaranteed” under national labor law.
A spokesperson for X didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment.
“After 12 amazing years and three weeks of chaos, I’m officially fired by Twitter,” Yue said in a tweet on Nov. 15. “Never expected I might have stayed this long, and never expected I could be this relieved to be gone.”
The NLRB said it’s in search of to “Make Yao Yue whole for any direct or foreseeable pecuniary harm, in addition to other consequential damages suffered consequently of Respondent’s illegal conduct” along with providing “all other relief as could also be just and proper to treatment the unfair labor practices alleged.”
A hearing on the case is scheduled for Jan. 30, in San Francisco.
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