Several conservative activists have sought to identify social media users whose posts about Kirk they viewed as offensive or celebratory, targeting everyone from journalists to teachers.
It’s far from the first time workers have lost their jobs over things they say publicly — including in social media posts.
“The First Amendment does not apply in private workplaces to protect employees’ speech,” said Andrew Kragie, an attorney who specializes in employment and labor law at Maynard Nexsen.
“People don’t realize when they’re on social media, it is the town square,” said Amy Dufrane, CEO of the Human Resource Certification Institute.
Many employers are reviewing their policies on political speech and providing training about what appropriate conduct looks like, both inside and outside the organization, she said.
NEW YORK (AP)— Several employees, including MSNBC political analyst Matthew Dowd, have been fired for remarks they made about the shooting death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk in the days that followed.
Targeting everyone from journalists to educators, conservative activists have attempted to identify social media users whose posts about Kirk they consider offensive or celebratory. The right-wing influencer Laura Loomer declared that she would attempt to destroy anyone’s career goals who rejoiced over Kirk’s passing.
This is by no means the first time that employees have been fired for public statements, including posts on social media. However, given how quickly the terminations have been occurring, concerns regarding the rights of employees versus employers are raised.
In the United States. S. . States may have different laws, but generally speaking, workers who are disciplined for their speech both inside and outside of private workplaces have very few legal protections.
As the associate general counsel and vice president of HR Services at Engage PEO, Vanessa Matsis-McCready stated, “Most people believe they have the right to free speech, but that doesn’t necessarily apply in the workplace.”. The majority of private sector workers lack workplace protections against that kind of speech. “.”.
In addition, social media’s widespread use has made it easier to monitor workers’ behavior outside of work and to dox individuals—posting information about them online with the intention of hurting or harassing them.
Employers are very flexible.
State-by-state variations exist in worker protections. For instance, in New York, an employer cannot fire a worker for taking part in a weekend political demonstration if the worker does not identify with the company they work for when they return to work. That same employee, however, may face repercussions at work if they attend a company function on a weekend and discuss their political beliefs in a way that makes others feel threatened or that targets them for harassment or discrimination, according to Matsis-McCready.
A majority of the U. S. . falls back on “at-will” employment law, which basically gives employers the freedom to hire and fire workers as they see fit, even if it means ignoring their opinions.
“In private workplaces, the First Amendment does not apply to protect employees’ speech,” stated Andrew Kragie, a Maynard Nexsen employment and labor law specialist. In actuality, it upholds employers’ authority to decide on workers based on their speech. “”.
There are “pockets of protection” all over the United States, according to Kragie. S. . under a number of state laws, including ones that prohibit disciplining employees for their political beliefs. However, he points out that there are ambiguities in the interpretation of how that is enforced.
Steven T. Collis, a professor of law at the University of Texas at Austin and the faculty director of the Bech-Loughlin First Amendment Center at the university, also cites state statutes that prohibit employers from terminating employees for “lawful off-duty conduct.”. However, there is frequently an exception for behavior deemed to be detrimental to an employer’s operations or reputation, which may give rise to dismissal due to remarks made in public or on social media.
“In this case, even with one of those laws in place, an employer may still be able to fire an employee if someone believes that the employee is glorifying or celebrating a murder,” Collis said.
The procedure is somewhat different for public employees, which can include elected officials, postal workers, and school teachers. Collis explains that this is because the First Amendment has a special function in situations where the government is the employer. According to a Supreme Court decision, an employee may be protected if they are speaking on a topic of public interest while acting in a private capacity. However, he pointed out that employers in the government have the authority to discipline an employee if they believe their actions will impede the government’s capacity to carry out its duties.
In response to Kirk’s passing, some public sector employees have already attempted to censor remarks. Pentagon leaders, for example, declared a “zero tolerance” policy for any posts or remarks made by soldiers that ridicule or celebrate Kirk’s death.
Pentagon top spokesman Sean Parnell made the announcement on social media Thursday, just hours after a number of conservative military activists and influencers started sending Parnell and his boss, defense secretary Pete Hegseth, posts they deemed problematic.
Parnell wrote Thursday, “Celebrating or mocking the assassination of a fellow American by military personnel and civilians in the Department of War is unacceptable.”.
A flurry of political discussion.
Social media’s widespread use has made it simpler than ever to express views on politics and significant news events as they happen. However, social media posts leave a record, and during periods of growing political polarization, those statements may be viewed as harming a person’s or their employer’s reputation.
“People are unaware that social media is the town square,” stated Amy Dufrane, the Human Resource Certification Institute’s CEO. They aren’t speaking to their neighbor in private over the fence. They are actually expressing their opinions. “.”.
Social media is by no means the only place where political discussions take place; they are also increasingly appearing in the workplace.
According to Matsis-McCready, “the gamification of the way we communicate in the workplace, Slack and Teams, chat and all these things, are very similar to how you might interact on Instagram or other social media, so I do think that makes it feel a little less formal and somebody might be more inclined to take a step and say, ‘Oh, I can’t believe this happened—'”.
Employers have not prepared.
Considering the tense and divided U.S. S. . The Human Resource Certification Institute reports that many HR professionals have stated that they are ill-equipped to handle politically sensitive conversations at work. But since those discussions will take place, employers must establish guidelines for what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate behavior in the workplace, according to Dufrane.
“HR needs to really dig in and make sure that they’re very clear on their policies and practices and communicating to their employees what their responsibilities are as an employee of the organization,” Dufrane stated.
According to her, a lot of companies are reevaluating their political speech policies and offering training on proper behavior both within and outside the company. And some of them might have reacted more strongly in the days after Kirk’s death because of how brutally he was killed.
“I believe that employers are really concerned about keeping the workplace safe and that they’re being extra vigilant about anything that could be viewed as a threat, which is their duty, because of the violent nature of what some political discussion is now about,” Matsis-McCreedy stated.
Workers may also be viewed as brand ambassadors, and depending on what they say and how it is interpreted, their political speech may damage a company’s reputation and weaken its brand. As a result, she said, more businesses are responding to what workers are saying online.
“When some of the people posted and their posts went viral, their employers’ phone lines started receiving constant complaints,” Matsis-McCready said.
However, experts like Collis don’t expect a big shift in how companies monitor their employees’ speech, pointing out that online activity has been scrutinized for at least the past 15 years.
He asserted that employers have been screening workers based on their social media posts for a very long time.
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