The Elon Musk-owned SpaceX won a court order stopping the Department of Justice’s hiring discrimination lawsuit from moving forward, as reported earlier by . In a choice on Wednesday, US District Judge Rolando Olvera ruled that the DOJ’s administrative judges don’t have the authority to review the case.
The DOJ sued SpaceX in August over allegations that the corporate refused to rent asylum seekers and refugees. The agency, which has been investigating SpaceX’s hiring practices since 2020, accused SpaceX of discouraging refugees and asylum seekers from applying “by wrongly stating that SpaceX can only hire U.S. residents and lawful everlasting residents.”
SpaceX countersued the DOJ in response, alleging that the executive law judges (ALJs) on the case were “unconstitutionally appointed” because they possess authority that only those appointed by the president must have. Judge Olvera sided with SpaceX in his ruling and said that the judges don’t have the authority to oversee the case. The DOJ declined to comment.
SpaceX has denied claims that it engaged in hiring discrimination. “SpaceX has not engaged in any practice or pattern of discriminating against anyone, including asylees or refugees. On the contrary, SpaceX desires to hire the easiest candidates for each job no matter their citizenship status, and in actual fact has hired lots of of noncitizens,” the corporate argued in its countersuit.