Musk previously offered to fund suits for X users who ‘were unfairly treated by your employer due to posting or liking something,’ and former Star Wars actor Gina Carano is taking advantage of the offer.
Three years after Disney cut ties with The Mandalorian’s Gina Carano, the actor is now filing a lawsuit against the company — with a little help from Elon Musk.
As The Hollywood Reporter reports, Carano is suing Disney for discrimination and wrongful termination after she was fired following inflammatory and antisemitic posts on X (then Twitter) and Instagram. At the time of Carano’s firing, Disney said in a statement that “her social media posts denigrating people based on their cultural and religious identities are abhorrent and unacceptable.”
As for the timing, Carano is filing the lawsuit now because Musk posted in August of last year that “if you were unfairly treated by your employer due to posting or liking something on this platform, we will fund your legal bill.”
In a post on X, Carano says that she reached out soon after that to see if she qualified. “To my surprise, a few months ago I received an email from a lawyer who had been hired by X to look into my story & many others,” she wrote. “Turns out after sending them as much information as I could gather these past few months, my now lawyers & X believe whole-heartedly in my case & are moving forward.”
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the actor is seeking “a court order that would force Lucasfilm to recast her and at least $75,000, plus punitive damages.”
Elon previously had a spat with Disney — and advertisers in general — after the company pulled advertising from X, alongside many others. In a rant in November, he said, “If somebody is going to try to blackmail me with advertising, blackmail me with money, go fuck yourself. Go fuck yourself. Is that clear? I hope it is.”
Of course, Musk is far from the first billionaire to back a lawsuit like this; in 2016 Peter Thiel admitted to supporting Hulk Hogan’s suit against the blog Gawker, which ultimately forced the company into bankruptcy. However, as The Hollywood Reporter notes, given that Carano was an at-will employee, she faces a much tougher road in getting damages.
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Andrew Webster
