Elon Musk, founder and chief engineer of SpaceX, speaks at the Satellite 2020 conference in Washington, DC, USA on March 9, 2020.
Yasin Ozturk | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images
Tesla is asking an appeals court to set aside a federal agency’s order that a Twitter message that discourages the organization from the account of CEO Elon Musk.
The National Labor Relations Board found that a tweet from Musk in May 2018 unlawfully threatened employees with the loss of stock options should they decide to be represented by a union. The council ordered that the post be removed.
The lengthy ruling of March 25 also recommends, among other things, that Tesla reinstate an employee who has been fired due to trade union organization and give a refund. The ruling also states that Tesla must post a notice about unfair labor practices in Fremont, California, where the United Auto Workers tried to organize 10,000 employees.
Tesla’s appeal was filed Friday in the 5th U.S. Court of Appeals in New Orleans.
Musk tweeted on May 20, 2018: “Nothing that prevents the Tesla team at our car factory from voting for the union. Can do it tmrw if they want to. But why should you pay unions and give up price options for nothing? Our safety record is twice that better than when planting was UAW and everyone is already getting health care. “