Musk promises to help canceled workers sue their employers

The US billionaire vowed to foot the legal bills of every employee “unfairly treated” over their tweets

The billionaire owner of X, formerly known as Twitter, has offered legal help to users unfairly fired, canceled or otherwise mistreated by their employers over posts they had shared or liked.

“If you were unfairly treated by your employer due to posting or liking something on this platform, we will fund your legal bill,” Elon Musk tweeted on Saturday evening. “No limit. Please let us know.” 

Musk, who has championed himself as a “free speech absolutist,” was forced to follow through on his promise to acquire the company for around $44 billion last October.

Since then, he has fired around three quarters of Twitter’s staff and introduced a controversial paid subscription model in a bid to make the company profitable. He has also rolled back many of the company's restrictive speech policies and released troves of documents detailing its collaboration under previous management with the US government and pro-censorship NGOs, to stifle anti-establishment content.

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Critics have accused Musk of turning the social media giant into a haven for bigotry and hate speech by loosening its censorship policies.

However, the billionaire has struggled to convince some conservative Twitter users of his free speech credentials since hiring NBCUniversal advertising chief and World Economic Forum member Linda Yaccarino as the platform’s new CEO in June.

This comes despite his taking a swipe at liberal bogeyman and fellow billionaire George Soros, and hosting anti-woke Florida governor Ron DeSantis’ announcement of entry into the 2024 Republican presidential candidate race.  

Recently rebranded as X, Twitter has complied with 80% of all government takedown requests in the first six months since Musk took over as CEO, a significant increase from the 50% rate in the pre-Musk era.