A federal judge in the United States has rejected a request by 26 Meta employees to temporarily halt their terminations while they litigate a lawsuit alleging that the company used artificial intelligence tools to select employees for layoffs, which harmed workers with disabilities or who were on medical leave.

US District Court Judge William Orrick in Oakland, California, ruled against issuing an injunction preventing Meta from completing its planned layoffs starting July 22. He said the employees had not shown they would suffer “irreparable harm,” a necessary condition for a temporary halt to the decision.

Despite rejecting the request, the judge indicated he might reconsider if both parties provided additional evidence showing whether AI tools were actually used in making layoff decisions.

The lawsuit, filed earlier this week, accused Meta of relying on artificial intelligence systems to assess employee productivity and their use of AI tools. This allegedly harmed workers who had been absent due to health conditions or family leave.

Employees also claimed that the company used performance evaluations that included indicators related to employees’ adoption of AI technologies, which affected their ranking in layoff lists.

According to the lawsuit, the case is the first of its kind against a major US corporation alleging the use of artificial intelligence in employee termination decisions.

Meta said that the layoffs were decided by human officials, not AI systems, rejecting accusations against it.

The employees' lawyers explained that the court had approved that the case raises "serious questions" about the company's practices, noting that a preliminary injunction request is still under consideration.

During the hearing, the plaintiffs' lawyers said that employees are not only losing their jobs but also their salaries, stock options, and health insurance on which some rely during pregnancy or treatment for illnesses. They emphasized that these damages cannot be compensated later.

In response, Meta replied that employees will not lose full health coverage, but rather the support that the company bore. It considered any financial losses to be compensable if the employees receive favorable verdicts in the arbitration.

Last May, Meta announced the layoff of around 8,000 employees, equivalent to about 10% of its global workforce, as part of a restructuring focused on increasing investments in AI technologies.

According to the lawsuit, the company used several internal systems supported by AI to evaluate employees. These include Metamate, an assistant based on large language models; an internal system described as "a second brain" for tracking correspondence and documents; productivity indicators based on keyboard clicks, screen content, email, and browsing history analysis.

Plaintiffs argue that these systems continued to calculate performance indicators even during legal or medical leave, leading to lower evaluations for some employees and increasing the likelihood of their inclusion in layoff lists.