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Judge roasts Chipotle for firing guy who grilled bean counters on Twitter

'Burrito' giant told to wrap up social media policies

A US judge says fast-food "burrito" chain Chipotle broke US labor laws by sacking an employee after he trashed his bosses on Twitter.

The court sided with James Kennedy of Havertown, Pennsylvania, in his wrongful termination suit. Judge Susan A Flynn awarded back pay and forced Chipotle to offer to re-hire Kennedy, 38, who has since found another job with American Airlines.

According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, Kennedy was fired from his position at Chipotle after he posted a tweet critical of the company and then started a worker petition.

Though the tweet has since been deleted, it emerged Kennedy told both a customer and the corporate ChipotleTweets account: "nothing is free, only cheap #labor. Crew members only make $8.50hr how much is that steak bowl really?"

Kennedy was told by his managers to remove the tweet, which he did, but later circulated a petition among colleagues complaining of a lack of breaks. When Kennedy's bosses found out about this, he was fired.

The case was taken up by the Pennsylvania Workers Organizing Committee, who filed on Kennedy's behalf with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) and Judge Flynn for review.

The NLRB ruled that Chipotle's social media policy and its "prohibitions against spreading incomplete, confidential, or inaccurate information and those against making disparaging, false, or misleading statements" in employee posts and tweets was a violation of the National Labor Relations Act.

"Having determined that Kennedy's tweets satisfy both prongs of the analysis – they were protected concerted activity and were for the purpose of mutual aid or protection – I further find that the Respondent's request that Kennedy delete those tweets was unlawful," Judge Flynn said in her ruling [PDF].

Additionally, the NLRB found that Kennedy's manager was in violation of his rights when first disciplining and later firing him for spreading the petition over the lack of proper breaks for employees.

The decision could force other companies to re-think their own policies over employee social media behavior. Judge Flynn noted that while an employer couldn't strictly govern disparaging statements made by employees, policies forbidding offensive, threatening, and intimidating posts were legal and actions based on those policies would not be a violation of worker rights. ®

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