Elon Musk is learning the hard way (again) that X is not his personal diary (which might have been a good lesson to learn before he bought it).
Last week, a federal appeals court upheld a lower court ruling that Musk illegally threatened workers via tweet (or whatever we’re supposed to call it now) by suggesting that they would lose stock options if they unionized. The court additionally held that his car company, Tesla, illegally fired a worker, for unionizing efforts. Days later, Musk was also ordered to face a separate lawsuit over claims that he defrauded Twitter shareholders by failing to disclose his investment in the company in a timely manner.
All of this comes after yet another controversy — this time over some pretty blatant racism. Last Thursday, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission dropped a bombshell lawsuit against Musk’s electric car company, Tesla. The lawsuit alleges that the company allowed pervasive racial harassment of Black employees at their Fremont, California plant.
The allegations are jarring. According to the lawsuit, Black employees were routinely called racial slurs, including the n-word, which was uttered on a daily basis. Nooses and swastikas were allegedly drawn over the facility’s public spaces, which, if true, feels like kind of a big thing for the company to miss.
The issues allegedly spanned across the company. Employees who complained about this mistreatment were allegedly terminated, transferred, or had their responsibilities shifted.
This also isn’t the first time Musk’s companies have come under fire for alleged workplace misconduct. It’s not even the first time this specific plant has faced allegations of racism. Tesla was previously sued by seven women in 2021, who claimed that the company allowed rampant sexual harassment to occur. Tesla had to pay $137 million in damages when an employee claimed they’d dealt with racist abuse at the very plant site at the center of this lawsuit.
Oh, and last month, the Justice Department sued Musk’s company, SpaceX, over allegations that SpaceX discriminated against refugees and asylum seekers.
This latest lawsuit only furthers concerns that Musk has no business running a social media website that already has a massive white supremacist problem.