Speaker 1: Michael Best with Jean Grasso. Susan Fowler is an engineer
Speaker 1: who worked at Uber. On Sunday, Fowler, who recently left
Speaker 1: the company, posted on her blog an account of sexual
Speaker 1: harassment against her, alleging that her boss at Uber tried
Speaker 1: to have sex with her and that when she reported it,
Speaker 1: the company told her it would not be doing anything
Speaker 1: about it. Uber CEO Travis Klanic issued a statement calling
Speaker 1: the allegations abhorrent and against everything Uber stands for and
Speaker 1: believes in, and the company has now hired former Attorney
Speaker 1: General Eric Holder to lead an independent review of the
Speaker 1: allegations UH and also about diversity and inclusion issues at Uber.
Speaker 1: More broadly, Fowler's accusations are the latest in a line
Speaker 1: of claims by women that their sideline in Silicon Valley's
Speaker 1: male dominated culture. Here to talk with us about this
Speaker 1: situation is Michael sell Me, a professor at George Washington
Speaker 1: University Law School. Michael um so Ms. Fowler writes this
Speaker 1: blog post, what what is she detailing? Happened during the
Speaker 1: course of her time at Uber. UH daily agencies detailing
Speaker 1: or you know as you mentioned are similar to a
Speaker 1: lot of UH allegations that have been coming up recently,
Speaker 1: um in the listen since she's alleging imparting egregious sexual harassment.
Speaker 1: But equally important, I think the for Uber where they
Speaker 1: have really moved quite quickly on is the fact that
Speaker 1: they told her specifically or supersized stores specifically, that they
Speaker 1: would do nothing about it, So they were they were
Speaker 1: not concerned about these allegations at all, Michael. There have
Speaker 1: been surveys. There was one in by the Elephant in
Speaker 1: the Valley that found that six of women in tech
Speaker 1: have experienced unwanted sexual advances from colleagues. There have been
Speaker 1: there's been a lot on social media, a lot of
Speaker 1: different claims. What is there about tech or is there
Speaker 1: something about tech that makes it more susceptible. There's probably
Speaker 1: a couple of different things. Whether it makes it more
Speaker 1: susceptible or not to an industry, that's hard to say.
Speaker 1: But I think with respect to tech tech um UH,
Speaker 1: it's clearly been a male dominated UH industry. It's also
Speaker 1: filled with a lot of younger people UM. And it's
Speaker 1: certainly when the companies began, or when so Colon Valley
Speaker 1: was going, they were not as concerned about legal restraints
Speaker 1: as a lot of other more mature industries would have been.
Speaker 1: So I think there was a bravado among a lot
Speaker 1: of the people in the industry. Um uh that may
Speaker 1: be not so prominent in other UH industries. UM and
Speaker 1: then uh um the use UH possibly might be part
Speaker 1: of it too. But I think it's you know, a
Speaker 1: combination of things that has made the tech world so
Speaker 1: susceptible to these allegations. Michael, what do you expect that
Speaker 1: Attorney General Holder is going to end up doing in
Speaker 1: this investigation? Well, that's always hard to know. Um. These
Speaker 1: allegations were just reported. As as far as i'm there
Speaker 1: has not been a formal complaint filed, and so he
Speaker 1: would probably take the place of well would would do
Speaker 1: what you know, the UC or another agency might do
Speaker 1: in terms of the investigation, UM, with interviews and the like.
Speaker 1: And I presume he will come up with a report
Speaker 1: fairly quickly, would be my guest to that all this
Speaker 1: will move, you know, quite quickly. It's it may seem
Speaker 1: unusual that a lawsuit hasn't been filed yet, or that
Speaker 1: she hasn't gone outside the agency rather posting on a blog.
Speaker 1: What does that tell you it is unusual? Um? And
Speaker 1: the fact that the blog was the way that she
Speaker 1: chose to uh make these allegations public is highly unusual.
Speaker 1: Whether it's um, you know, there was recently the Fox
Speaker 1: News allegations that hit the news very quickly and settled
Speaker 1: very quickly. And I think maybe what you're seeing as
Speaker 1: a strategy that bringing public attention to these allegations UM
Speaker 1: is the quick this way to a settlement. Well, Michael,
Speaker 1: when you look at the kinds of allegations she's making here,
Speaker 1: what what is it that Uber should have done. Well,
Speaker 1: certainly they should have had a plan in place, which
Speaker 1: they may have formally had when most businesses do for
Speaker 1: their employees to report harassment and to report harassment uh
Speaker 1: generally to the human resources officer as opposed to supervisors.
Speaker 1: There should have been an investigation of those and internal
Speaker 1: investigation of those allegations, UM. And then you know, consistent
Speaker 1: with then investigation, there should have been some determination of
Speaker 1: the merits on med and if they proved to be
Speaker 1: true accurate, uh, then there certainly should have been some
Speaker 1: discipline for the offending party. And it sounds like they
Speaker 1: skipped all of those steps. Well, our thanks to Michael
Speaker 1: sell Me, a professor at George Washington University Law School
Speaker 1: for being here on Bloomberg Law. Coming up on Bloomberg Law,
Speaker 1: will be talking about a decision by a federal magistrate
Speaker 1: which refused to give the government a warrant that would
Speaker 1: force people to compel to use their fingerprints to open
Speaker 1: their cell phones, even though there was a warrant to
Speaker 1: search a computer on the on the premises when the
Speaker 1: police got there. The police also wanted to be able
Speaker 1: to force anyone who had a cell phone, uh that
Speaker 1: would require their fingerprint to use their fingerprints to open
Speaker 1: it up, and a judge said that would violate their
Speaker 1: constitutional rights and he was not going to issue it. Uh,
Speaker 1: we're gonna be talking about that decision coming up straight
Speaker 1: ahead on Bloomberg Glove