{"id":1974,"date":"2022-03-22T14:39:45","date_gmt":"2022-03-22T14:39:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/03\/22\/google-settles-with-engineers-who-said-they-were-fired-for-trying-to-organize\/"},"modified":"2022-03-22T14:39:47","modified_gmt":"2022-03-22T14:39:47","slug":"google-settles-with-engineers-who-said-they-were-fired-for-trying-to-organize","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/03\/22\/google-settles-with-engineers-who-said-they-were-fired-for-trying-to-organize\/","title":{"rendered":"Google settles with engineers who said they were fired for trying to organize"},"content":{"rendered":"

Source: https:\/\/www.theverge.com\/2022\/3\/21\/22989683\/google-fired-engineers-union-settlement-lawsuit-project-vivian<\/a>
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Google has settled with six engineers over claims the company squashed employees\u2019 efforts to organize, as first reported by Motherboard<\/em><\/a>. The specifics of the settlement remain under a non-disclosure agreement, but four of the workers who were allegedly fired out of retaliation for their labor activism<\/a> in 2019 will not be reinstated, while one still remains employed by the tech giant.<\/p>\n

Four employees, Rebecca Rivers, Laurence Berland, Paul Duke, and Sophie Waldman, filed labor charges against Google in 2019<\/a> after the company said they were fired because they violated its data security policies. Prior to their termination, they rallied against some of Google\u2019s ethically questionable choices, including its work with the Customs and Border Protection (CBP)<\/a>, despite the agency\u2019s treatment of immigrants and enforcement of family separation policies. Berland reached a settlement with Google<\/a> last year.<\/p>\n

Another employee, Kathryn Spiers, was fired shortly after for creating internal pop-ups<\/a>, saying, \u201cGooglers have the right to participate in protected concerted activities.\u201d The pop-up would appear when employees viewed Google\u2019s internal employee guidelines or visited the website of IRI Consultants, an anti-union firm that Google hired. Google says Spiers was fired for not getting proper approval for the code she used to create the notification.<\/p>\n

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It took over 2 years of fighting. Over 2 years of living in a near-constant hell.<\/p>\n

But, it is finally over.<\/p>\n

Fighting for workers’ rights is hard, it hurts, but seeing the impact that we have helped make in the Labor Organizing movement is worth it. https:\/\/t.co\/MWuX3zqbs4<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Rebecca Rivers (@Tri_Becca90) March 21, 2022<\/a>\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

In 2020, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) filed a complaint against Google, claiming the company illegally spied on Berland and Spiers before firing them<\/a>, and said that Google \u201carguably violated\u201d labor laws<\/a> by firing Waldman, Rivers, and Duke. The NLRB took the tech giant to trial last year, and over the course of the two-year-long legal battle, the NLRB uncovered something called Project Vivian<\/a>, Google\u2019s secret union-busting initiative. In January, the court ordered Google to hand over more internal documents that the company attempted to conceal by claiming attorney-client privilege.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt took over 2 years of fighting. Over 2 years of living in a near-constant hell. But, it is finally over,\u201d Rivers said in a tweet<\/a>. \u201cFighting for workers\u2019 rights is hard, it hurts, but seeing the impact that we have helped make in the Labor Organizing movement is worth it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last November, Waldman, Rivers, and Duke filed a separate lawsuit against Google<\/a>, stating they were contractually obligated to follow the company\u2019s famous \u201cdon\u2019t be evil\u201d policy, which is why they protested against Google\u2019s contract with the CBP. This lawsuit was dropped as part of the settlement, according to The New York Times<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very proud of what my clients accomplished: they fought aggressively \u2014 and successfully \u2014 in exposing Google\u2019s plan which was orchestrated at the highest level of internal management to quell union organizing and stop its employees from speaking out about matters that were simultaneous of work place and global concern,\u201d Laurie Burgess, the attorney representing the employees said in a statement to The Verge<\/em>. \u201cI am confident that my client\u2019s success here \u2014 effectively bringing Google to its knees \u2014 will encourage other Googlers and for that matter employees in other industries to pick up the baton and continue the efforts to hold corporations accountable for their actions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Google didn\u2019t immediately reply to The Verge<\/em>\u2019s request for comment.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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Source: https:\/\/www.theverge.com\/2022\/3\/21\/22989683\/google-fired-engineers-union-settlement-lawsuit-project-vivian<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Source: Google has settled with six engineers over claims the company squashed employees\u2019 efforts to organize, as first reported by Motherboard. The specifics of the settlement remain under a non-disclosure agreement, but four of the workers who were allegedly fired out of retaliation for their labor activism in 2019 will not be reinstated, while one […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1975,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,8],"tags":[10],"class_list":["post-1974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-google","category-technology","tag-google"],"yoast_head":"\nGoogle settles with engineers who said they were fired for trying to organize - Science and Nerds<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/03\/22\/google-settles-with-engineers-who-said-they-were-fired-for-trying-to-organize\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Google settles with engineers who said they were fired for trying to organize - Science and Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Source: Google has settled with six engineers over claims the company squashed employees\u2019 efforts to organize, as first reported by Motherboard. The specifics of the settlement remain under a non-disclosure agreement, but four of the workers who were allegedly fired out of retaliation for their labor activism in 2019 will not be reinstated, while one […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/03\/22\/google-settles-with-engineers-who-said-they-were-fired-for-trying-to-organize\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Science and Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-03-22T14:39:45+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-03-22T14:39:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/03\/google-settles-with-engineers-who-said-they-were-fired-for-trying-to-organize_6239dfb1ec9b1.jpeg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"628\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/03\/22\/google-settles-with-engineers-who-said-they-were-fired-for-trying-to-organize\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/03\/22\/google-settles-with-engineers-who-said-they-were-fired-for-trying-to-organize\/\",\"name\":\"Google settles with engineers who said they were fired for trying to organize - 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