NBC and Questlove are looking to get the racial discrimination lawsuit against them thrown out of court in part, they claim, because it doesn’t belong in court in the first place.
As The Blast first reported, two former employees of “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” claim they were fired at the behest of Questlove and they feel they were targeted because they were white.
The two men claimed they had simply received a racist text message (they never responded to it) and reported it to their supervisor. After a seven-week investigation, they claim Questlove “pressured NBC to fire all of the Caucasian employees involved in the incident.”
NBC and Questlove are finally responding to the suit, claiming that the two men had an obligation to take their claims to arbitration, rather than file a lawsuit. They claim “at no time prior to commencing this action did Plaintiffs or the Union file a grievance relating to these allegations or submit any claim to Solutions” (that is the name of NBC’s alternative dispute resolution procedure).
They are looking to have the case kicked back to arbitration, where they claim it belongs, or dismissed entirely (safe to assume that is their preferred outcome).
A judge has yet to rule.
