Meta is facing a lawsuit alleging its AI systems did the firing before humans signed off.
Twenty-six former employees terminated in Meta's May round of mass layoffs claim the company used AI-powered tools — including productivity scores, LLM usage tracking, and an internal model called Metamate — to rank workers for termination. The lawsuit alleges these systems penalized employees with reduced output expectations due to medical conditions, maternity leave, or disability accommodations. Plaintiffs argue the tools were never properly screened for bias, violating federal anti-discrimination law as well as specific California and New York City statutes. They're seeking a California federal court ruling to pause their July 22 termination dates while arbitration proceeds.
The case lands at an awkward moment for Meta, which explicitly tied its May layoffs to AI investment priorities — meaning the company simultaneously cited AI as the reason for cuts and, according to plaintiffs, used AI to decide who got cut. That's a tighter loop than most algorithmic-bias lawsuits allege, and it gives plaintiffs a more concrete target than abstract claims about automated decision-making.
Meta spokesperson Andy Stone flatly denied the allegations on X, writing that "workforce management and organizational decisions were and are made by people, not AI." That denial may be technically true — humans presumably approved final lists — but it sidesteps the core allegation that the lists themselves were AI-generated. Separately, remaining Meta employees raised concerns that the company's Model Capability Initiative was collecting more employee activity data than disclosed, adding a potential European data-law angle to an already complicated picture.