Author name: Kyle Olson

DEI, DEI Pushback

Judge Rules in Favor of White Ex-IBM Employee Fired Over Diversity Quotas in an Ongoing Case

A U.S. District Judge in Lansing, Michigan, has ruled in favor of a white ex-IBM employee to allow a racial and gender discrimination lawsuit to proceed. Judge Hala Jarbou, a Trump appointee, said the plaintiff, Randall Dill, had provided sufficient grounds to sustain the case.

Dill alleges that he was terminated from his position to accommodate more employees from minority backgrounds to attain the company’s diversity goals. 

The lawsuit stated that IBM’s CEO and Board Chairman, Arvind Krishna, allegedly directed all executives “to move forward by 1% on both underrepresented minorities.” His objective was to have female employees account for 50% of the workforce and increase the percentage of Black employees to 13% and Hispanics to the “mid-teens.”

IBM executives, including Dill’s immediate supervisor, Zook, and Kevin Henning, Zook’s supervisor, stood to gain financially from achieving DEI goals or lose their bonuses or even employment on failure.

According to the lawsuit, the “quota system is tied to bonus compensation in such a way that it incentivizes impermissible racial discrimination and disincentivizes refusal to engage in such discrimination.”

Dill says his supervisors used various ploys to terminate his employment to achieve diversity goals by increasing the percentage of minority employees. 

He claims that, despite his clients rating him highly, he was put on a performance improvement program typically reserved for underperforming employees. The program was based on a client rating system with an average score of 8 out of 10 considered satisfactory. Dill’s clients frequently rated him no less than 9 out of 10.

Yet, his supervisors blamed him for a “low-utilization rate” and failing to enroll more clients, which was beyond his control “as he could not control whether IBM signed a new client or whether one of its existing clients chose Dill as its consultant.” His situation was also not unusual, as half of the employees in his division were on the bench.

“Dill alleges grounds for believing that his managers were, in fact, motivated by improper reasons. He alleges that they had financial incentives to terminate a white male employee like himself in order to alter the racial and gender composition of his division in accordance with IBM’s Diversity Policy,” the lawsuit states.

However, IBM denied the allegations and requested the judge to dismiss the case for failure to state a claim, arguing that Dill had failed to identify other employees in similar situations who were treated differently. 

Nonetheless, the court denied IBM’s motion for dismissal, stating that “Dill has provided enough facts to state viable race and gender discrimination claims against IBM.”

“Taken as true, Dill’s allegations plausibly support an inference that IBM improperly considers race or gender as a factor in employment-related decisions,” Jarbou stated.

However, IBM publicly denied the allegations, terming them as baseless.

“These allegations are baseless, as neither race nor gender played any role in the decision to end this individual’s employment with IBM,” the company said.

Dill is represented by America First Legal, founded by the former senior advisor to President Trump, Stephen Miller.

“We look forward to continuing to litigate this case and fight for justice on behalf of our client,” said America First Legal’s attorney, Andrew Block.

Big Government, Uncategorized

Biden’s EPA Makes First Climate Change Arrest Related to “Illegal Greenhouse Gases”

The Biden administration’s EPA is boasting of a supposed pivotal milestone in its fight against “climate change”: the criminal prosecution of an “illegal greenhouse gases” importer.

In September, the Department of Justice convicted Michael Hart, 58, of illegally importing “potent greenhouse gases” from Mexico into the United States. 

According to court documents, Hart and his accomplices imported banned hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) and hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs) and sold them online for profit. “Once the orders were placed, Hart purchased the refrigerants in Mexico with the help of his conspirators and illegally imported them into the United States concealed in his vehicle,” the DOJ said in a press release.

“Thereafter, Hart illegally sold the refrigerants to others in the United States, profiting from the black market for such refrigerants in the United States.”

Smuggling banned gases into the United States attracts a maximum sentence of five years in federal prison and a $250,000 fine.

Meanwhile, the EPA attributed the arrest, prosecution, and conviction to “revitalized enforcement and compliance efforts,” which it fears might lose momentum when Trump takes office on January 21st. However, Trump has not indicated that he will open the floodgates of illegal environmental substances into the country.

Similarly, while Biden’s EPA celebrates stopping the flow of banned greenhouse gases into the country, the case is similar to others involving smuggling illegal and harmful products. However, such convictions rarely make grand political statements that Biden’s EPA can take credit for to advance the administration’s political climate agenda.

Nonetheless, Biden’s EPA carried out other enforcement actions, including imposing $1.7 billion in penalties, the highest amount since 2017. The agency also settled 1,851 civil cases and criminally charged another 121 defendants. The EPA says Hart’s conviction is just the beginning of more to come.

“The progress made under the Biden-Harris Administration has sent a clear signal that polluters will be held accountable and that protecting communities from harm is a top priority,” said David M. Uhlmann, assistant administrator for EPA’s Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance.

Biden’s EPA categorizes methane produced during routine dairy and oil production alongside banned industrial HFCs and HCFCs. 

In 2022, the administration proposed incentives for dairy farmers to capture and sell methane for energy production. However, climate change activists opposed the measure, saying it could incentivize large farms to produce more methane. 

Recently, the EPA finalized a rule imposing taxes on oil and gas sector facilities for failing to control their methane emissions at the rate of $900 per cubic meter in 2024, $1,200 in 2025, and $1,500 in 2026 and beyond.

Meanwhile, the EPA says it is trying to put the American Innovation and Manufacturing Act, which targets an 85% reduction in hydrofluorocarbons by 2036, into action. However, such ambitious incentives usually carry hidden costs that American consumers pay for without realizing corresponding environmental benefits.

President Trump’s EPA chief, Rep. Lee Zeldin, has promised to rein in the agency and undo some of the damage done by draconian anti-business regulations. Rep. Zeldin says some level of deregulation is crucial for stepping up gas and oil production, lowering pump prices, and reducing the cost of living.

Uncategorized

“Abandon Harris” Backs Leftist Jill Stein

The Abandon Harris campaign gathered in Dearborn on Wednesday for “a great announcement” with Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein. “Our demands were simple,” director Hassan Habdel Salam said, flanked by supporters toting “Abandon Harris” and “Abandon Genocide” signs. “A permanent unconditional ceasefire, and a full arms embargo.”

Salam detailed how the campaign repeatedly reached out to President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and the Democratic Party to understand the concerns of Muslim and Arab voters disgusted with the current administration’s handling of Hamas’ war against Israel. “Again and again, silence from the (Biden-Harris) administration,” he said.

The situation culminated with an endorsement of Stein on the eve of Hamas’ Oct. 7 that sparked the ongoing conflict, and Wednesday’s press conference to explain why the campaign opted for a third-party endorsement. “As we went through the campaign, the White House sent their surrogates and a message from the president telling us that we were experiencing a tantrum,” Salam said. “And today that tantrum is a mountain as we set course.

Read More at The Midwesterner

Uncategorized

Michigan Governor Hosted CCP Member at Summer Residence

Text messages between Gotion Vice President Chuck Thelen and former Green Charter Township Supervisor Jim Chapman confirm Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) hosted a member of the Chinese Communist Party at the governor’s summer residence on Mackinac Island.

Thelen was organizing a visit to Green Charter Township for Gotion High-tech Chairman Zhen Li in mid-2023, according to texts recently made public from a lawsuit involving the company and township.

In an April 2024 Q & A, Thelen was asked if Zhen Li had ever visited Mecosta County (in Michigan) and he answered affirmatively, but went beyond that: “We’ve also met with some higher officials in Lansing. We met some higher officials in another location during the summer time because those officials were on vacation so we went to where they were,” Thelen said.

In the text messages between Thelen and Chapman, Thelen said the “chairman” wanted to visit July 12th or 13th. “I hope to visit the (proposed Gotion) site early afternoon then (Ferris State University) for a short tour and then we have to meet Gretchen (Whitmer) on Mackinac Island,” Thelen wrote. Photographs that circulated throughout the Green Charter Township community on July 11 showed several representatives of Gotion in the area that day. Zhen Li is founder of Gotion High-Tech and Gotion Inc. is the wholly owned U.S. subsidiary. He is a former government employee and participant in the local communist government leadership.

Whitmer gave Gotion $715 million in Michigan taxpayer cash and incentives.

Read the Full Story at The Midwesterner


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