WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, America First Legal (AFL) filed a lawsuit on behalf of its client against International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) for allegedly violating Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by terminating AFL’s client to meet their race and sex-based employment quotas. This is the second case AFL has filed in recent months related to alleged unlawful employment practices at IBM or its subsidiary entities.
AFL’s Client
AFL’s client began working for IBM in October 2016 as a Senior Managing Consultant supporting existing clients on long-term projects. He was a model employee and consistently received high scores on IBM’s primary employee performance metric, the “Net Promotor Score,” which is calculated directly from client feedback and overall satisfaction.
While at IBM, AFL’s client received strong performance reviews and was publicly recognized on multiple occasions in his division’s monthly all-hands meetings for his outstanding performance, with management quoting his feedback from clients and applauding his work.
By all accounts, AFL’s client was a high-performing employee at IBM.
In July 2023, without notice or warning, IBM placed AFL’s client on a Performance Improvement Plan (PIP), citing reasons completely outside of his job description, work history, and control. Even worse, the PIP was generalized, vague, and lacked any concrete measures or metrics for success.
Despite this, AFL’s client made a good-faith effort to follow the terms of the PIP and keep his job at IBM. He requested resources from IBM to help him secure a prospective client, which went largely unanswered. In October 2023, IBM terminated his employment.
IBM’s Discriminatory Policies
At the time IBM fired AFL’s client, IBM’s corporate policies incentivized executives to make decisions about employees based on their race and sex. These incentives, which included executive bonuses, were directly tied to IBM’s race and sex quotas for employees, which are illegal under federal law.
Per IBM’s 2023 ESG Report, they report:
By instituting bonus incentives for hiring and promoting quotas tied to race and sex, IBM established discriminatory employment policies and motivated supervisors to reduce the number of employees outside of “preferred” racial and sex-based categories.
These discriminatory policies were discussed by IBM’s Chief Executive Officer Arvind Krishna as far back as 2021, in undercover videos released on X by James O’Keefe.
This lawsuit is AFL’s second lawsuit against IBM for discriminatory and unlawful employment practices. On May 8, 2024, AFL sued IBM’s subsidiary, Red Hat, for violating Civil Rights laws by allegedly engaging in discriminatory employment and termination practices against white males.
AFL is committed to holding IBM accountable for its alleged racial and sex discrimination.
Statement from Gene Hamilton, America First Legal Executive Director:
“Employers across the United States should make employment decisions based solely on merit—not immutable characteristics that individual Americans cannot control. No one should be discriminated against based on their race or sex, and we are committed to vindicating our client’s rights in court,,“ said Gene Hamilton.
Read the lawsuit here.
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