Woman who gave Trump finger files suit over job

A Virginia woman and Columbus native who lost her job with a government contractor after she was photographed extending her middle finger at President Donald Trump’s motorcade last year has sued her former employer for wrongful termination.

Juli Briskman, who graduated from Worthington High School in 1985 before attending Ohio State University, directed the gesture toward Trump’s motorcade as it zoomed by her while she was bicycling Oct. 28. The motorcade was leaving Trump National Golf Course in Sterling, Virginia. Photographers in a car behind her captured the moment, which spread online and made for jokes on late-night television.

But Briskman’s employer, Akima LLC, did not find it funny.

When she returned to work the following week, she said, executives told her she needed to resign. Briskman, 50, had violated the company’s social media policy on obscenity by sharing the image on Facebook and Twitter, they told her, according to her lawsuit in Fairfax County Circuit Court in Virginia.

The executives also feared blowback from Trump, Briskman said.

‘‘I was fired from my job because my employer feared unconstitutional retaliation,’’ Briskman said Thursday afternoon. ‘‘But on a larger scale, I feel that our democracy is being threatened.’’

Her lawyers assert that Briskman’s gesture was ‘‘core political speech’’ protected by Virginia law and the Constitution. She is seeking $2,692 for two weeks of severance she said she was promised but never received, as well as payment for legal fees.

Akima, which has government contracts in cybersecurity and national security, did not respond to a request for comment.

Briskman said she has another job, but ‘‘whether I landed on my feet or not is besides the point.”