"Elon's behavior in the public sphere is a frequent
source of distraction and embarrassment for us, particularly in recent
weeks," reads the letter, which was posted Wednesday to an internal
Microsoft Teams channel, according to a report Thursday from The Verge.
"It is critical to make clear to our teams and to our potential talent
pool that his messaging does not reflect our work, our mission, or our
values."
Musk, who's also the head of electric-car company Tesla, is
outspoken on Twitter and has more than 98 million followers. He's rankled
people with tweets critics have called sexist and juvenile, among other things.
The letter from SpaceX employees reportedly said that every tweet from Musk is
seen as a "de facto public statement by the company."
SpaceX didn't respond to a request for comment.
The employees are asking the company to hold leadership
responsible for fostering an inclusive workplace and to clearly define and
enforce workplace culture policies. They specifically asked leadership to
condemn the CEO's Twitter behavior. Musk is also trying to buy Twitter.
The letter comes nearly a month after reports that the
company paid a $250,000 settlement to a flight attendant who said Musk exposed
himself to her. Musk denied the allegations on Twitter, calling them
"utterly untrue." SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell also reportedly
defended Musk in an email to employees, saying she'd worked "closely with
him for 20 years and never seen nor heard anything resembling these
allegations."
Multiple women last year made allegations of sexual
harassment at SpaceX, including a former engineer who wrote in an essay that
the company's culture was in a "state of disrepair and dysfunction so
great that the only remedy, finally, was to leave."
Tesla has also faced lawsuits over sexual harassment at one
of its plants and was sued in February by the California Department of Fair
Employment and Housing for alleged racial discrimination and harassment.
Tesla said in a blog post at the time that it "strongly
opposes all forms of discrimination and harassment and has a dedicated Employee
Relations team that responds to and investigates all complaints."
It's unclear how many SpaceX employees have signed the
letter to executives. It's reportedly expected to be delivered to the desk of
Shotwell.