Former Bloomberg Staffers File Class Action Lawsuit Over Pay Dispute

Poor mini mike, he just can’t catch a break. After blowing through nearly $1 Billion dollars on his failed Presidential run, little mikey bloomberg  is now being sued by as many as 2,000 now-former campaign staffers over promises of pay that Bloomberg is now reneging on. Evidently the old boy worth $60 Billion promised to pay his staff through the election in November, and he’s now backing out of that deal. 

Politico reports:

Former campaign workers for Mike Bloomberg are suing the billionaire former presidential candidate for fraud, alleging in a nationwide class action lawsuit that as many as 2,000 employees were promised to be paid though the general election before he laid them off.

Plaintiffs in the class action include two organizers who halted the interview process for other jobs to join the Bloomberg campaign, and another former organizer who postponed law school to work on Bloomberg’s 2020 effort.

The filing comes on the same day as another class action brought by a former Bloomberg field organizer that similarly argues the employees were tricked into taking jobs they were told would continue for a year.

The lawsuit by the three former workers in Georgia, Utah and Washington state, also filed in federal court in New York City, contends that the field organizers were fraudulently induced to accept jobs with the Bloomberg campaign based on the promise of guaranteed salaries though November. The ex-field staffers who filed the suit, Alexis Sklair, Nathaniel Brown, and Sterling Rettke, are represented by Peter Romer-Friedman of Gupta Wessler PLLC, and Ilann M. Maazel and David Berman of Emery Celli Brinckerhoff & Abady LLP.

Bloomberg on Friday purged all of those workers in six battleground states and guaranteed they would be paid only through the first week of April, with their benefits expiring at the end of that month. The first big round of layoffs across the rest of the country happened earlier this month, with their pay lasting though March 31.

Oh but it gets even more hilarious. Apparently the campaign workers were pressured to sign NDA’s that prevent them from saying anything negative about the tiny tyrant, as the article continues:

Attorney for one of the group of litigants said in a statement that while “our clients would like to speak publicly about their experiences, they are potentially subject to a confidentiality and non-disparagement agreement with Mike Bloomberg 2020. We respectfully request that the Bloomberg campaign release our clients and the other field staffers from that agreement, even though it may not be enforceable.”

And the pay? Well that reputed to be some of the highest wages in the business, to the point where experienced staffers were bailing from other campaigns to cash in on the Bloomberg train:

Bloomberg field organizers were among the highest compensated in the election cycle, and enjoyed generous health benefits, in addition to $5,000 for relocation costs.
While all of the field organizers are believed to have signed at-will contracts with the campaign, they argue in the lawsuit that they can bring these claims based on evidence that they were induced to sign on because of the longevity promises made to them.

The promise of sustained pay months after a campaign ends is exceedingly rare in politics. But in more than a dozen interviews with POLITICO, the former aides said it was key to their decision to join. Bloomberg quickly amassed a staff of thousands after launching in November, then ended his campaign after a feeble showing on Super Tuesday.

Since news of their dismissal, scores of former Bloomberg staffers have been organizing online in preparation for taking legal action. They’ve established several chat and email groups to share their experiences, with many expressing deep frustrations about losing their pay and health care benefits in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.

And this coming from the party that markets themselves as caring for the workers and fighting the rich.