GitHub’s human resources boss has resigned over the dismissal of a Jewish employee who warned his Washington colleagues to watch out for Nazis.
The platform, which is owned by Microsoft – which uses software developers to share and collaborate on code – said its HR boss accepted ‘personal liability’ for the flap and resigned on Saturday after an outside investigation found that the termination failed.
The unidentified employee was arrested on January 8, two days after he allegedly sent a Slack message urging DC area staff to be careful as Trump supporters storm the Capitol.
“Stay safe friends, Nazis are over,” the staff member wrote according to TechCrunch.
Photos of the Capitol riots showed how the insurgents had a variety of Nazi and white supremacist symbols. For example, authorities arrested Robert Keith Packer, a man from Virginia, last week in a sweater with the words ‘Camp Auschwitz’, an apparent reference to the infamous Nazi death camp.
Despite this, one of the employees’ associates complained about his message and an HR representative claimed that he was “showing a pattern of behavior that is not conducive to the company’s policies”, he told TechCrunch.
The eviction of the employee caused a setback among many of his GitHub colleagues, who, according to Business Insider, distributed a letter demanding that the company expose Nazis and white supremacy.
GitHub launched an independent investigation on January 11 that revealed “significant errors of judgment and procedure” in the case, said Erica Brescia, chief operating officer, in a Sunday blog post.
“In light of these findings, we immediately reversed the decision to divorce the employee and we are in touch with his representative,” she wrote. “We want to say to the employee in public: we sincerely apologize.”
GitHub on Monday did not immediately respond to an email asking if the employee had returned there.
Brescia has not identified the HR executive who resigned as a result of the investigation, but Carrie Olesen was listed as the head of human resources on the GitHub website earlier this month, according to an archived version of the website. Olesen’s name no longer appears on the website on Monday morning.
Brescia also acknowledged that ‘Nazis and white supremacists’ were part of the mob that carried out the ‘horrific’ Capitol attack that left five people dead and forced lawmakers to hide.
“Employees are free to express their concerns about Nazis, anti – Semitism, white supremacy or any other form of discrimination or harassment in internal discussions,” Bresica’s blog post said.
“We expect all employees to be respectful, professional and to follow GitHub policies on discrimination and harassment.”