Tesla is set to face trial on Monday in a lawsuit that accuses the automaker of allowing rampant racial discrimination at its flagship assembly plant in Fremont.
The case was filed by the California Civil Rights Department and will be heard in Oakland before Superior Court Judge Peter Borkon. The proceedings are scheduled to run until October 30.
The agency’s director, Kevin Kish, said in a statement that the department looks forward to holding Tesla accountable.
With thousands of workers involved and Tesla’s high public profile, the case is among the most significant employment discrimination trials against a major U.S. company in recent years.
Judge Borkon will decide the case himself in a bench trial, without a jury. Unlike federal anti discrimination law, California law does not cap damages, meaning Tesla could be ordered to pay many millions of dollars if it loses.
Tesla has for nearly a decade faced accusations that it fostered a climate that was extremely hostile to Black workers at its Fremont plant and other facilities. The company is also being sued by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission for alleged racial harassment, alongside dozens of individual lawsuits making similar claims.
The claims made by the Civil Rights Department are broader, including allegations that the Fremont plant was racially segregated and Black workers were assigned to the lowest paying and least desirable jobs.
Last year, Judge Borkon ruled in a separate lawsuit that more than 6,000 Black workers could not sue Tesla as a class, reversing an earlier decision in a major victory for the company.
Tesla has settled some individual cases, including one involving a former elevator operator at the Fremont plant who was awarded $137 million by a jury, a sum that was later cut by a judge.
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