Eight dismissed SpaceX engineers have filed a lawsuit against Elon Musk in a California state court for sexual harassment and retaliation. This was reported by Bloomberg.
“Musk knowingly and purposefully created an unwelcome hostile work environment based upon his conduct of interjecting into the workplace vile sexual photographs, memes, and commentary that demeaned women and/or the LGBTQ+ community,” the document says.
According to the plaintiffs, some of them were then subjected to offensive comments from other colleagues who “mimicked Musk’s posts” from Twitter and “created a wildly uncomfortable hostile work environment.”
After the billionaire publicly ridiculed the allegations of misconduct, employees in 2022 wrote an open letter expressing concerns about Elon Musk’s behavior and company culture. The employees claim that they were fired in response.
They also have reason to believe that the businessman personally made the decision to fire them. When the HR officer suggested conducting an investigation first, Elon Musk replied that he “doesn’t care – fire them.”
The lawsuit also claims that SpaceX executives, including the billionaire, participated in a video that “that mocks and makes light of sexual misconduct and banter,” including a scene in which an employee demonstrates the “proper” way to spank a colleague.
Separately, The Wall Street Journal reported on allegations that Elon Musk harassed women at SpaceX, including a former intern with whom he allegedly had an affair.
SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell accused the magazine of reporting falsehoods and said that “Elon is one of the best people I know.”
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