Companies take action over employees’ behavior
Chicago-area CEO fired after participating in siege at US Capitol
With their reputations at stake, companies are taking swift action against employees who breached the U.S. Capitol as well as some who say they merely attended Wednesday’s rally at President
Donald’s Trump’s urging.
Employers across the country have fired workers who were arrested for their actions during the events or were shown in social media images as being there. Some businesses are facing calls for boycotts because their owners attended the rally.
The professional fallout is likely to continue as social media sleuths identify more participants and businesses face public pressure to take a position on their employees’ behavior.
Schaumburg-based Cogensia, a tech company, on Friday evening announced it fired its CEO, Brad Rukstales, after he was charged in federal court with violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds. The company said his actions are inconsistent with its values.
“Cogensia condemns what occurred at the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, and we intend to continue to embrace the values of integrity, diversity and transparency in our business operations, and expect all employees to embrace those values as well,” the company said in a news release.
The company, which initially placed Rukstales, 52, on a leave of absence following his arrest for unlawful entry, faced a deluge of criticism on Twitter for not firing him at the outset.
According to CBS 2 Chicago, Rukstales said in a written statement Thursday that he “followed hundreds of others through an open set of doors to the Capitol building to see what was taking place inside” and deeply regretted his participation.
“Without qualification and as a peaceful and law-abiding citizen, I condemn the violence and destruction that took place,” he said, according to the statement. It adds: “It was the single worst personal decision of my life; I
have no excuse for my actions and wish that I could take them back.”
Employers must navigate legal as well as business considerations as they determine how to respond to employees’ participation in Wednesday’s events.
Most reports of firings involve people who were shown to be inside the Capitol, which was stormed by a mob of Trump supporters while Congress was meeting to certify that Presidentelect Joe Biden had won the election. But some who lost their jobs, including a real estate agent with Chicago-based @properties, say they didn’t know the breach of the Capitol was taking place and were only protesting outside.
For the most part, private-sector employers can fire employees for any reason and are not constrained by the First Amendment rights to free speech that apply to public-sector employees.
While some states have laws that protect people from being disciplined for expressing political views while off duty, Illinois does not.
Still, employers have to be careful and evaluate situations on a case-bycase basis because it could shape the workplace going forward, experts say.
“This is a characterforming moment for these companies,” said Brayden King, professor of management at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management. “If they decide to fire someone for just being at the protest it sets a precedent for the future.”
The trend in corporate American has been to allow employees to engage in politics that are important to them, but Wednesday’s incident was different because it was quickly labeled an act of insurrection rather than a political protest, King said.
“If the company doesn’t do something about it, it appears as though they are tolerating an extreme form of deviant behavior,” King said. “They don’t want to be seen on the wrong side of history.”
The biggest concern companies have is their long-term reputation and how their employees perceive them, King said. They are usually less concerned about backlash from consumers, who may talk a big game about boycotting on social media but before long will go back to buying the products and services that are most convenient to them, he said.
Kwabena Appenteng, an attorney who represents management in the Chicago office of Littler Mendelson, said during the past four years since Trump became president he has been fielding questions from corporations concerned about how employee participation in political activities affects the rest of the workforce.
But Wednesday’s event was different from a typical “Make America Great Again” rally, he said, and the storming of the Capitol raised concerns about attendance that wouldn’t normally be an issue.
“Here it was you were amongst a group of people who engaged in violence,” Appenteng said. “Whether you went with them or not, you were among them.”
Employers are acting swiftly because of the potential for their personnel issues to go viral on social media and generate a larger backlash against the company.
“That’s the biggest driver now for a lot of our clients,” Appenteng said. “We don’t want this to go viral and become a bigger issue.”
Reports of firings have emerged froma handful of companies across the country.
Chicago’s @properties said on Twitter it fired Libby Andrews after she posted on social media about “storming the Capitol.” The real estate firm said it “does not condone violence, destruction or illegal activities.” Andrews said she did not enter the building butwas just at the rally.
Navistar Direct Marketing, a Maryland-based firm, announced it fired an employee who was seen wearing his work badge inside the Capitol, saying in a statement that “while we support all employees’ right to peaceful, lawful exercise of free speech, any employee demonstrating dangerous conduct that endangers the health and safety of others will no longer have an employment opportunity with” the company, according to various news outlets.
Texas- based Goosehead Insurance fired an associate general counsel after he live-streamed his participation in the event, according to Bloomberg Law.
Saint Vincent College in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, accepted the resignation of an adjunct professor who posted a video on Facebook fromthe scene, Reuters reported. Rick Saccone confirmed his resignation to Reuters and said he did not see acts of violence and never crossed the threshold of the Capitol.
Businesses being linked to rally attendance also are also getting backlash.
A photo taken at the rally of Donald Rouse Sr., owner of a regional supermarket chain in Louisiana called Rouses, spurred thousands of social media posts calling for a boycott of his stores. Rouse issued a statement saying he left the Trump rally before violence broke out at the Capitol, which he condemned.
In Chicago, the Wicker Park tattoo parlor Insight Studios has been vandalized and employees have received death threats after a photo of several employees standing outside at the Trump rally circulated on social media, according to the WBBM Radio, which interviewed one of the employees who attended the rally.
According to WBBM, Mat Moreno said he went to the rally with three friends and co-workers out of curiosity, but left after Trump spoke and before the mob entered the Capitol. “I condemn racism in every sense of the word,” he told the station. A call to Insight Studios Friday went unanswered.
Yelp temporarily disabled postings to the tattoo parlor’s reviews page because it has “recently received increased public attention, which often means people come to this page to post their views on the news rather than actual consumer experiences with the business.”
The dog rescue OneTail at a Time, based in Bucktown, posted on its Facebook page Thursday that it would cut ties with Insight Studios, which in the past had been a partner at its Tattoos for Tails fundraising events, because of the photo.
“We are extremely grateful for the generosity they showed us over the years, but it has become clear that our values diverge at too great a point to be able to continue that partnership,” One Tail’s posting said.
The organization did not respond to a request for comment.
The condemnation , often on social media, of rallygoers raises some legal questions. Posts that label people racists or white supremacists could spur claims of defamation if they are untrue, said Phillip Schreiber, an attorney in the Chicago office of Holland & Knight who represents management in employment cases.
Employers deciding how to handle employees who participated in the protests should look at the facts of each case, including whether they engaged in criminal activity and the potential impact on the workplace, Schreiber said. The behavior of an executive might have different consequences for the company than a lowerlevel employee, and acompany that employs mostly Trump supporters may have a different approach than one with a more Democrat-leaning workforce.