Karen Attiah, a 39-year-old opinion writer recently dismissed from The Washington Post, has filed a grievance alleging her termination violated the newsroom’s labor agreement and social media policy.
Attiah, who was fired earlier this month after posting commentary on Bluesky about the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, argues that her posts fell within her role as an opinion writer and were protected under union rules.
The grievance, filed by The Post’s labor union last week, was followed by a four-page letter from Attiah’s attorneys to the company’s head of human resources seeking damages for what they describe as an unlawful firing.
In the letter, her lawyers wrote that Attiah “spoke truthfully and forcefully about matters of vital public concern.”
The termination notice attached to her letter states that Attiah’s posts violated company policies by harming the paper’s integrity. The Washington Post’s guidelines instruct staff to use social media “responsibly and civilly” and to treat others with respect.
Attiah’s posts addressed issues of political violence, racial inequities, and gun availability in the United States. One of her most discussed comments argued that “part of what keeps America so violent is the insistence that people perform care, empty goodness and absolution for white men who espouse hatred and violence.”
Critics accused Attiah of misquoting Charlie Kirk in a separate post regarding his comments about the “brain processing power” of prominent Black women, including Michelle Obama and Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.
Attiah initially suggested Kirk was speaking about all Black women, but later corrected the record days after her firing. That clarification, however, was not cited in The Post’s termination notice.
The Washington Post has not publicly responded to Attiah’s grievance or the letter from her legal team.
