Last September three women filed a lawsuit against Mayor Bloomberg’s company, Bloomberg LP, accusing Bloomberg of being personally responsible for creating a "systemic, top-down culture of discrimination," and accusing Bloomberg LP CEO Lex Fenwick of firing two pregnant employees with this gangsta riposte: “I'm not having any pregnant bitches working for me.”
Now other 54 women have joined the lawsuit, after the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission [EEOC] conducted interviews with 478 woman who took maternity leave from the company during the last six years. In a hearing at U.S. District Court yesterday, an EEOC attorney said that number continues to grow.
The suit accuses the company of discriminating against women by cutting pay and demoting them to less important positions when they reported that they were pregnant. The discrimination is alleged to have occurred after Bloomberg became mayor and formally relinquished his position as chief executive. But the lawsuit contends that Bloomberg is still very much involved in the company.
When asked about the case yesterday at a press conference about the city budget, the mayor said, “I have absolutely no idea” and was very annoyed, because he was taking questions about the budget, "What does this have to do with the budget?... Stick to the topic. Everybody else plays by the rules; you’ll just have to as well.” Will these unconscionable reporters ever learn to stay on message?
A Bloomberg LP spokeswoman pointed out the company, which has thousands of employees in over 100 offices globally, has only had two dozens employment-related lawsuits had been filed against it and a Bloomberg LP lawyer said the company had turned over a million pages of data to the EEOC.
