Tesla Inc. stated that the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission was investigating the firm prior to a lawsuit filed by California’s civil rights agency accusing it of disregarding “rampant racism” on its manufacturing assembly line. In a court filing, the world’s largest electric vehicle manufacturer revealed the federal investigation while urging a judge in Oakland, California, to halt a suit filed by the state’s Department of Fair Employment and Housing in February.
Tesla, according to the state agency, ignored years of complaints about racial slurs at its Fremont facility, where 20,000 people work. The automaker, on the other hand, claims that DFEH is acting outside of its legal power and that it is “using litigation as a bullying technique and to advance its turf war” with the EEOC.
As they probed Activision Blizzard Inc. on charges of a culture of sexual harassment and discrimination against female employees, the agencies’ feud erupted into the open.
DFEH’s actions in the Activision case and other high-profile probes, according to Tesla, demonstrate that the agency has “abandoned its fundamental goal” in favor of producing dramatic headlines.
DFEH “conducted a bare bones’ inquiry” without “interviewing key witnesses, obtaining critical documents, or ever stepping foot in the Fremont factory,” according to Tesla. The DFEH began examining Tesla in 2019, and the EEOC’s investigation began earlier, according to the company’s filing on Monday.
California filed a lawsuit against Tesla Inc, alleging discrimination and harassment of Black employees at the company’s manufacturing in the San Francisco Bay area. Hundreds of worker complaints prompted the lawsuit, which was filed in Alameda County Superior Court, according to Kevin Kish, director of the state’s Department of Fair Employment and Housing.
They found evidence that Tesla’s Fremont factory is a racially segregated workplace where Black workers are subjected to racial slurs and discriminated against in job assignments, discipline, pay, and promotion, creating a hostile work environment, according to the department, which enforces state civil rights laws.
Tesla has faced numerous lawsuits and disputes as a result of CEO Elon Musk’s remarks and actions, as well as charges of creative accounting, whistleblower retaliation, worker rights abuses, and unresolved and dangerous technical issues with their cars. Following the agency’s investigations into traffic deaths involving the usage of Autopilot, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) ordered Tesla to submit data on all sold US vehicles equipped with Autopilot in September 2021.
