Man allegedly fired for being fascist. Can you be fired for political beliefs?

You're a little bit more than a far-right Republican

Hey, what can I say? I think you can say I'm a fascist. Yeah, I am

That self-described fascist is Conor, and he's now out of a job after his employer saw him

on an episode of Surrounded by Jubilee. Conor started a fundraiser and says he'll use the money

as an emergency fund while he's in between jobs. In the Post, he blamed cancel culture for his firing

and wrote, quote, unfortunately voicing fully legal, traditional right-wing political views results in real consequences

He claimed his views are traditional right wing. Judge that for yourself

So you don't believe in democracy? No, I don't. Absolutely not. What do you believe in

Autocracy. By who? Honestly, quite frankly, anyone who is in line with Catholic teaching

So he says he got fired for that. The question is, can you get fired for your political beliefs

We're joined now by Nicholas Woodfield, the principal and general counsel at the Employment Law Group

Nicholas, thanks so much for joining us. So Nicholas, you watched some of the clips from the Jubilee video. Here's another

Are you a fan of the Nazis? I frankly don't care being called the Nazi at all

I didn't say that. I didn't actually say that. I said, are you a fan of the Nazis? So what do you make of Conor's case and the fact that he got fired for those statements

I think he got a little bolder in what he was saying. And by doing that, I think he got himself into a situation where he would have a hard time saying that he was fired for an improper purpose

And not only did he say that he believed that he was a fascist, but he also started citing political commentators that were cited by the Nazi party and that supported the Nazi party and said things that would align with Nazi beliefs

And that gets to the point where arguably you may be falling into the area of hate speech, where even if it was protected potentially under the First Amendment, you fall outside of the protections

But a lot of places will say, you know, once speech becomes disruptive, it's a basis for terminating you

So like if you're a if you're a baker and you work in a bakery and you're you're in the you know, in the front, you can't be fired because you voted for the Democrat or the Republican in the office

If however you start saying things like I am in favor of the Nationalist Socialist Party and I believe that there should be a general purging of people that are socially unacceptable in the society

You can probably fall out, even if you're saying I'm associated with these parties, if you're starting to espouse something that is hate speech

Let's say for the purposes of this conversation, his employer knew he had all the views that he expressed in the Jubilee video before they hired him

And they knew it all along. And the only thing that changed after the Jubilee video is that he said it in a public manner

Does that change anything? It doesn't matter. And the reason being is once he publicized that and someone looked him up and found him and they say he works for Bob's Groceries

they may look at Bob's groceries in a different way as a result of it

If the employer felt that what Connor said in that video reflected poorly on it potentially

or impacted its ability to serve as customers or its public reputation

then typically it would be justified. There's a difference between associating with a party and advocating a position

Can you be fired for your political beliefs? The answer is nuanced. Federal government, state governments, local institution governments, there's a slightly different standard. And in terms of your beliefs, if you're working for a private employer, it turns more along sort of what you're doing to manifest those beliefs

if you're in a private institution if you're working for a private employer

you cannot be terminated based on who you're politically affiliated with like in terms of what your political party might be or who you vote for it can get you fired if

you're you know if you're walking around with placards and and you know advertising your

positions because it can be disruptive. There's a time and a place for everything and you can't

necessarily subvert everything you're doing and say, I'm lobbying for someone or I'm campaigning

for someone at work because that can be disruptive to the actual job. But you also run into what's

called hate speech And hate speech is a slightly murky topic but it essentially when you start switching from sort of socially acceptable speech to less socially acceptable speech governed by the norms of most of the populace

I would imagine it depends on your job description too, because like, for instance, I'm a journalist

I'm not supposed to express any political opinions. And if I went on a political rant on social media, I would probably be fired for that, and rightfully so. So it not only depends on the view, but probably your position and what the expectations of your job are. Is that reasonable or correct

I think that's sort of a broadly correct summary. And I can't speak to your employer situation, but I think you compromise your ability as a journalist. If you're holding yourself out as an advocate for one position, you don't necessarily look like you are a disinterested observer. You seem to be aligning with someone right off

And for your employer, that may make it very difficult to hold itself out as an objective, disinterested news purveyor

It can hurt that employer's brand. So then maybe Straight Arrow News could say, well, we're not firing you for your First Amendment, for a First Amendment violation

We're firing you because you hurt our brand. And so it seems like that would be the place where you cross that line you discussed earlier, where it's no longer about the First Amendment

It's now about the brand. Yes, but remember the First Amendment is in the Constitution and it applies to the government

And that's the state and federal government. Private institutions are not the government

So the First Amendment, you can't go into work and say you work at Bob's Groceries and say

my First Amendment does this because the First Amendment doesn't apply to private employers like Bob's Groceries

In terms of what protections you do have as an employee and what you can and cannot say, you have a lot fewer protections working for a private employer

but also when you are, when your actions and your words or your actions negatively impact on the employer

then unless they protected unless they been made protected they not protected And so states will say you cannot terminate someone because of their religious or because of their political affiliation

You cannot terminate them because they voted one way in an election or another or because they had a sign in their yard

But that doesn't mean that you then have license to go on and editorialize at work

That's disruptive. And so if you are a disruption in the workplace because you're advocating for a position that

is an opposite from your work, if your job is to make donuts and you are keeping everyone

from making donuts all day because you are proselytizing about a political position

that you're a liability at work. It doesn't matter. You're a distraction

And let me ask you this final question. I've seen employment contracts in certain states and companies are at will employers. And so these employment contracts can say you can resign or be fired for any reason or no reason. How does that factor in

let me start off by saying it doesn't. You'll hear people say, I work in Washington state

and that's a right to work state. Well, everyone works there. The US is different than Europe

where most people have employment contracts and you can't fire people except for certain

justifications. And if you're in the federal government, once you get past a probationary

period, you can't be fired for arbitrary reasons. But in most employment situations throughout the

United States, you can quit your job without giving 30 seconds notice, and there's no consequences

Likewise, you can fire people for good reasons, bad reasons, made up reasons, pretend reasons

just not for illegal reasons. And so that you put it on a piece of paper saying that you can quit

or I can fire you is just memorializing the status quo of the law. The simple

thing is pretty much everything is legal unless the law has made it illegal

And so the question is, is it illegal to terminate someone for a particular reason

And if it hasn't been made illegal, it's legal. Nicholas Woodfield, principal and general counsel at the Employment Law Group, thank

you very much for joining us. I appreciate it. You're very welcome