Salesforce says it will help employees leave Texas after strict abortion law passed
Salesforce CEO Mark Beinoff said the company will help employees move out of Texas if they so choose after the state's Republican governor signed a strict ban on abortions. "Ohana if you want to move we'll help you exit TX," Beinoff tweeted Friday, sharing a link to a CNBC article about the company's decision.
"Ohana" is a Hawaiian word that encompasses blood and accepted family.
The new law bans abortions as early as six weeks of pregnancy, becoming the nation's most restrictive measure on abortions. The law also allows civilians to sue anyone who helps someone get or performs an abortion for up to $10,000.
In a Slack message last week, Salesforce told employees: "These are incredibly personal issues that directly impact many of us — especially women," according to CNBC, which obtained a copy of the memo. "We recognize and respect that we all have deeply held and different perspectives. As a company, we stand with all of our women at Salesforce and everywhere."
Salesforce, which owns Slack, is a software company that creates platforms for other businesses, helping them manage customers and data.
The San Fransisco-based company has office locations around the U.S., including in New York, Atlanta, Chicago and Dallas. CBS News has reached out to Salesforce for further information and is awaiting response. It was not immediately clear whether any employees had requested to move.
Abortion providers asked the Supreme Court to put the Texas law on hold, but the high court ruled 5-4 against providing relief. Texas Governor Greg Abbott defended the controversial law, saying that it doesn't force victims of rape and incest to carry their pregnancy to term because it "provides at least 6 weeks for a person to be able to get an abortion."
Last week, the Justice Department filed suit against the state of Texas over the law, saying it was enacted in "open defiance" of the Constitution. The lawsuit came days after Attorney General Merrick Garland pledged to explore "all options" to challenge the measure and protect access to the procedure.
Salesforce is no stranger to social activism. Earlier this year the company announced it opposed Georgia's restrictive voting rights bills, which the company said were "inconsistent with our nonpartisan principles on protection of voting rights." Several other companies with locations in Georgia spoke out against the bill and vowed to boycott the state.
In 2016, Benioff used Salesforce as as a platform for social activism by fighting North Carolina's so-called "bathroom law" which prevented transgender individuals from using public bathrooms that do not match their biological gender.
"I'm doing this really on behalf of my employees... I'll get an email or someone will come into my office and say, 'I am being discriminated against and you have to do something for me,' so I will jump in and help them," Benioff told "CBS This Morning" at the time.
