Twitter seeks dismissal of disability bias lawsuit over job cuts

Dec 22 (Reuters) – Twitter Inc (TWTR.MX) has requested a federal decide in California to toss out a proposed class motion saying the mandate by CEO Elon Musk that personnel return to the business and set in “long hours at large depth” discriminates against workers with disabilities.

Twitter’s attorneys late Wednesday filed a motion to dismiss the November lawsuit, declaring the plaintiffs had not alleged that any of the company’s steps ended up specific at people today with disabilities or had a disproportionate effect on them.

Twitter laid off about 3,700 personnel in early November in a cost-slicing evaluate by Musk, who acquired the firm for $44 billion and is also the CEO of Tesla (TSLA.O). Hundreds a lot more resigned following he requested employees “to be exceptionally hardcore” or stop.

The lawsuit statements Musk’s ultimatum violated the federal Us residents with Disabilities Act (ADA), which involves employers to present fair accommodations to workers with disabilities.

The two plaintiffs are engineering professionals who say they had been respectively laid off and fired previous thirty day period. They assert several Twitter workers with disabilities were forced to resign mainly because they could not return to the office environment and fulfill Musk’s demanding criteria.

The organization in Wednesday’s submitting stated the employee who was laid off signed an settlement to arbitrate work-associated lawful disputes and questioned to have his claims sent to arbitration.

The other previous employee, Dmitry Borodaenko, cannot characterize a class of workers due to the fact he was fired prior to Musk requested employees to commit to for a longer period several hours, the business mentioned.

Shannon Liss-Riordan, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, stated it was schedule for defendants to try to get scenarios dismissed early on.

“We will react in owing course, but we stand by these allegations and glimpse ahead to holding Twitter and Elon Musk accountable for his deplorable treatment of personnel about the final two months,” she claimed.

A listening to is scheduled on Twitter’s motion for April.

The lawsuit is one particular of four pending in the very same courtroom that stems from staff cuts at the company. The other instances accuse Twitter of not giving staff and contractors advance discover of the layoffs, failing to pay out promised severance and disproportionately concentrating on women for job cuts.

Dozens of previous Twitter workforce filed complaints versus the organization this 7 days in arbitration making very similar statements.

Twitter has denied violating legal guidelines necessitating advance observe of layoffs and has not responded to the other lawsuits.

(This tale has been corrected to reflect that a single plaintiff was laid off and is not a current staff in paragraphs 6 to 8)

Reporting by Daniel Wiessner in Albany, New York Modifying by Alexia Garamfalvi and Lisa Shumaker

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