A Black Tesla worker claims management at the electric car giant did nothing when white employees harassed and bullied him at work, including exploiting his grief after he was traumatized by deadly explosions while working as a government contractor in Afghanistan.
According to a lawsuit filed in February, Marcellous Cage worked as a contracted project manager for the Department of Defense and as a quality field manager with an engineering firm in Afghanistan prior to his employment with Tesla. He experienced severe explosions in Afghanistan, which was an active war zone at the time.
As reported by The San Jose Mercury News on Friday, Cage alleges his colleagues were aware of his Afghanistan experience, and used it to taunt him. While working in the company’s Nevada factory, Cage says he noticed dangerous welding conditions that could have led to shrapnel explosions. He says the situation made him uncomfortable because it reminded him of being seriously injured in Afghanistan blasts but when he alerted management to over 200 safety violations at the site, the company did nothing.
Cage also alleges that a Tesla coworker’s cell phone rang, which had a ringtone that sounded similar to rocket strikes. He says he explained to his coworkers that the sound was an emotional trigger but it only prompted several white coworkers to change their ringtones to “the same disturbing sound, purely to harass Mr. Cage.”
“Even more egregiously, the Construction Superintendent sarcastically told Mr. Cage to ‘get over it,’ and that it was good for him to hear the disturbing ringtone because he needed to ‘face his fears,’” the suit states.
The taunting was so emotionally intense that Cage had to leave the workplace to regroup, his lawyer told The Daily Beast.
“It’s certainly something that affected his ability to do his job,” attorney Justin Berger said. “It’s not something that he was just able to go with the flow. He was doing an important job, and these things interfered with his ability to do that.”
Cage also accused his Tesla colleagues of taking advantage of his fear of people walking up behind him, also due to his time in Afghanistan. In turn, he alleges coworkers mocked him for rearranging his office.
In addition, he alleges he encountered racist slurs in Tesla’s factories and offices, along with images of swastikas.
Cage was let go at the end of 2020 after submitting a number of violation reports. He asserts he was fired in retaliation.
Tesla has been under fire as of late for its treatment of Black employees. Former employee Kaylen Barker alleges the company ignored her complaints about mistreatment “reminiscent of the Jim Crow Era” at its California factory. In January, former worker Shanel Dickson—also in California—sued the company and her supervisor for alleged racial and gender discrimination and sexual harassment. A class-action lawsuit was filed in 2017 because its Fremont location was a “hotbed for racist behavior.”
Tesla did not immediately respond to The Daily Beast’s request for comments about Cage’s racism and bullying allegations on Friday.
