SpaceX Employees Say They Were Fired for Criticizing Elon Musk in Open Letter – Former SpaceX employees have filed complaints with the National Labor Relations Board stating that they were retaliated against for drafting a letter critical of Elon Musk, the company’s CEO. According to the New York Times, eight former employees who were fired in June helped mobilize employees to compose an open statement criticizing Musk’s online behavior.
The letter addressed, in part, a joke Musk tweeted about a report claiming he paid a $250,000 settlement to a flight attendant who accused him of sexual harassment. Musk has denied the allegations. “Elon’s behavior in the public sphere is a frequent source of distraction and embarrassment for us, particularly in recent weeks,” the letter, first circulated in June and obtained by the Verge, stated.
The New York Times said that after the letter was sent, a group of 20 employees met with a top SpaceX executive and were warned by Jon Edwards, vice president of Falcon Launch vehicles at SpaceX, that they were disrupting the company and that the letter was an “extreme act.” According to the allegation, nine employees were fired for challenging Musk.
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In the letter, employees complained that SpaceX was not adhering to its own “no asshole” policy and demanded that the firm “publicly address and condemn Elon’s harmful Twitter behavior.” Musk’s public retaliation against employees who openly corrected or criticized him at another company he currently runs aligns with the SpaceX accusation.
The New York Times stated that in addition to terminating Twitter employees who openly criticized Musk in tweets, Musk had also tasked subordinates with combing through internal correspondence to weed out critics. Musk’s companies have met opposition from the National Labor Relations Board, which protects employees’ rights to seek improved working conditions without fear of reprisal.
In March 2021, the NLRB affirmed a ruling that Tesla engaged in unfair labor practices by terminating a worker for seeking to unionize and by posting a tweet by Elon Musk discouraging unionization. In addition, Tesla ordered staff to “renew their vows” and sign a new secrecy agreement in reaction to leaks. The nondisclosure agreement, however, prohibited employees from speaking with the media and was deemed illegal.
SpaceX did not answer requests for comment immediately. In addition to denouncing Musk’s public actions, SpaceX employees requested in their June letter that the company reconfirm its commitment to the zero-tolerance policy regarding sexual harassment.
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While the letter addresses Musk’s tweets making light of the allegations against him detailed in the Business Insider report, some SpaceX employees have also previously spoken out about a culture of sexism and rampant harassment.
One former engineer, Ashley Kosak, said that her accusations of harassment at the company where she began as an intern were frequently ignored. Other female interns mirrored her allegations, stating that they too were subjected to unwelcome advances by male interns and males in higher-ranking positions.
