From Nasdaq:

The US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has urged a federal judge to deny Tesla’s request to pause a lawsuit accusing the electric carmaker’s California plant of racial bias. The lawsuit alleges racist slurs, graffiti, and retaliation against Black workers. It is not duplicative of two other pending racial discrimination cases against Tesla, as the company had claimed.

The agency has accused Tesla of filing a groundless motion in an attempt to divert attention from the substantive allegations and serious racial problems at its Fremont Facilities. The lawsuit claims that Black workers at the plant faced racist slurs and graffiti from 2015 to the present and have endured retaliation for complaining.

California’s Civil Rights Department brought a lawsuit in 2022, accusing Tesla of similar conditions and discrimination against Black workers. A pending proposed class action filed by Tesla workers in 2017 also alleges racial harassment. Tesla denies the allegations and is appealing a $3.2 million award granted to a Black former employee in a separate racial harassment lawsuit.

Tesla claimed that the EEOC suit was rushed as part of an interagency feud with the California agency. Tesla argued that the California case and proposed class action should play out before the EEOC case moves forward. However, the EEOC has argued that its case is not redundant because it alleges violations of federal workplace discrimination law, while the other cases involve California laws. Tesla also moved to dismiss the lawsuit, claiming the EEOC failed to identify specific instances of discrimination.



Read more: US agency suing Tesla for race bias says no need to pause lawsuit