A former Grindr Vice President has issued a wrongful termination suit against the gay dating app after she was fired in July.
Jing He served as the Vice President of Finance for just over a year and Grindr’s official line is that she was let go for “poor performance”. However, Jing is alleging that the management team took offence to her raising concerns that the company had breached federal law.
Grindr successfully applied for a Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) loan in April, a scheme brought in by the US government to help support businesses that were financially struggling due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
It received a loan of at least $1 million, which was supposed to save 69 jobs. Jing claims that no Grindr employees were at risk of being laid off and it was therefore an illegal recipient of the loan.
She was fired the day after explaining the issue to CFO Gary Hseuh, despite receiving a higher score than any other manager in her most recent performance evaluation.
According to Law360, Jing’s lawsuit affirms: “Grindr’s reasoning for firing [Jing] was a mere pretense.
“In reality, [Grindr] retaliated against plaintiff for disclosing information that plaintiff reasonably believed indicated Grindr had violated federal laws, rules and/or regulations in applying for, accepting and keeping the PPP loan.”
At the time, Reuters did question whether or not Grindr was entitled to support, considering the loan was meant to be for small businesses and the company had just been acquired in a deal worth $620 million.
Read more here.