Man who refused to work as he was ‘mourning’ after US abortion decision gets fired

Charlie Herbert

Man fired for mourning US abortion ruling

He called out his company for donating to ‘anti-abortion, anti-queer and anti-trans politicians’

An employee who refused to do a day of work because he was “mourning” the US Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v Wade has been fired.

Michael Lopez worked as production coordinator at Universal Music Enterprises, and shared the news of his dismissal on LinkedIn.

In the post he wrote: “I’m a queer brown person and I was fired during Pride month for speaking up in defense of abortion rights at Universal Music Enterprises.

“Last Friday, like countless other folks, I was devastated by the news of the Supreme Court’s attack on abortion rights.

“Paired with the flood of anti-queer and anti-trans legislation, it’s been hard to process how companies expect us to be productive while our rights are being stripped away. Especially when our company has been donating to several of these politicians.”

He explained that his job involved processing reports reports for upcoming releases and then emailing these to 275 people.

But in the email to his co-workers, he wrote that he “didn’t do them today” because he was “in mourning due to the attack on people with uteruses in the US. Federally guaranteed access to abortion is gone.”

He continued: “Vivendi and Universal Music Group must stop donating to anti-abortion, anti-queer and anti-trans politicians. Politicians like Marsha Blackburn, Ken Buck, Victoria Spartz, etc. Or expect more unproductive days.”

Lopez said he received support from many of his colleagues and that his manager told him to take the rest of the day off.

But he was “surprised” the next day when he received a Zoom call from human resources which informed him of the termination of his contract for “disrupting the day of 275 people and poor judgment.”

Shortly after, Lopez sent a follow-up email sharing his firing, writing to his colleagues: “Just got fired for this email from Friday, so they’re letting you know where they stand on employees speaking out on politicians that support marginalisation for folks like me.

“A brown queer person terminated during Pride month speaking in support of abortion rights. Seems like that’s exactly what America is all about right now.”

A spokesperson for Universal Music Group told the New York Post that the company has a long history of supporting women, and labelled Lopez’s post “inaccurate.”

They added: “In the wake of the recent US Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v Wade, the company has extended its efforts to assure that these important healthcare services remain accessible to employees.

“We also financially support non-profit groups working in this area and offer a match for employee’s contributions to those groups, as well.”

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