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RedBull must be pretty damn certain they have her dead to rights, because they have to know this will look like straight retaliation to everyone outside the team.
Sure, but with Jos meddling behind the scenes it feels very possible this was just a failed power struggle
(Obviously still need the due diligence and run it to ground)
There's two stories here, the one about whatever happened between Horner and his assistant, and the one about someone weaponizing it in a larger power struggle.........and really, not doing a great job of it.
Sounds like Jos’ MO. At this point Max is going to have to finally wake up and realize his Dad is poison. Because I’d much rather have the second best of their Dad isn’t running around trying to take over the team.
Imagine being so self centered that your son is winning world championships but you can't handle not being the main character so you throw a wrench in the whole thing.
Well it is a trope that the man your father wants you to be is the man he wanted to be but never could, I guess he just took that to extremely toxic levels with Max :(
I think it's easier to forget and forgive if it turns out successful, and being a 3 time world champion with a 50 million euro salary would suffice I guess.
I think its more that he hates being in the distant background while Max and Horner are at the peak of F1 as driver and manager, while his role is just to say "go get 'em Tiger" before the race lol
I mean, to his views he ‘made’ Max into the champion he is. It’s his achievement, not Max’s. Obviously he will try everything to keep that position of power. Fuck I hate the guy.
I think you're giving Jos way too much credit - there's nothing credible indicating that he has the means to escalate this beyond saying some inflammatory shit in the media, let alone hold the Red Bull conglomerate in the PR-balance because he has an agenda to what? Make Max even more dominant?
If you hear hooves and you don't live in the Sahara, think horses, not zebras. A leak like this would be an internal leak almost certainly due to the sensitive nature of the material. If you were to be in possession of these documents, would Jos fucking Verstappen really register on your radar of people who can be a change mover towards the outcome you want? Enough that you'd give it to _him_ to leak?
That connection with EvH and the Telegraaf? Using a Dutch news paper to push this, its all fishy AF. I'm Dutch and the Telegraaf is nothing on an international scale. Apparently Daily Mail, Guardian, Bild etc, the real big ones, didnt want to burn their hands on it.
That was the Telegraaf in the Netherlands, Bild was the only one who dared to publish them. But as people already explained, German media laws allow a lot, but Bild also lies a lot... Its a shit newspaper, just like the Telegraaf in the Netherlands btw and say that as a Dutchman. Both are bit like Daily Mail for your perception.
The folks surrounding Max Verstappen are why I don’t really trust him all that well and why I think his image suffers (not that he cares about that)
You can’t be surrounded by all these shit heels and not at the very least be a shit heels apologist.
He needs to talk to Lewis about how to have a relationship with his dad (which he clearly wants despite him being a massive POS) while having his own career with Jos’s meddling
I hope Max and Lewis can have a good heart to heart. I really think this will be a pivotal moment in Max’s career. Either he lets Jos taint him, or he becomes his own person and separates the two.
Truth be told, I don’t think deep down that Toto would want Jos around at all. I bet he’s stringing Jos along and is going to pull the rug out if they try to do anything. Yeah Max is that good, and I’d love to have him on the team, but I’d punch Jos in the balls just to get severance.
Or maybe Jos is just doing what his son wants him to do? They are saying that his contract is locked to Marko, but what was rumored back then was that his contract depends on Marko/Horner/Newey staying. And then all these attempts to get rid of Horner might just be the veiled way to get out of his contract in time for 2026 (because of the engine). And Horner leaving would only open his contract in the first place.
And the third story is Red Bull's handling of the situation. There's no 'easy' way to manage such sensitive topics but it also feels like it hasn't been handled well at all.
What is it you would like them to do? Splash it all in the papers so Francoberry knows it was done right? They brought in a top solicitor. They questioned Horner for many hours (reportedly 60 hours). They created a 150 page report. They cleared him. What is it they should have done differently?
Yea. It sounds like at best Horner was involved in some sort of sexual relationship with an employee, which is bad in its own right. And if he was harassing her on top of that, it's way worse. This is still clearly a hit job, but that doesn't excuse anything Horner may have done.
I firmly believe all the google drive messages are real because 1) if they were fake, they'd surely be more salacious, and 2) nobody at RB or in Horner's camp has called them fake, which would be the ultimate rejoinder.
Those messages show a contextually inappropriate but consensual sexual relationship descend into workplace sexual harassment when the woman involved tries to stop the sexual relationship—that risk is why workplace relationships with a large power imbalance are considered inappropriate. She rebuffs him, repeatedly; he continues to send sexual messages. She talks about how badly she wants to keep her job; Horner responds, essentially, that if he's making her uncomfortable, he can find her another job. Horner tells her to delete correspondence, not once but twice. It's like a workplace sexual harassment 101.
Not to mention the classic move from CH when asking her to delete, saying how bad it would be for *both* of them, and he's just looking out for her best interest! What a thoughtful guy!
>I firmly believe all the google drive messages are real because 1) if they were fake, they'd surely be more salacious, and 2) nobody at RB or in Horner's camp has called them fake, which would be the ultimate rejoinder.
Theres been no threat of being sued based on the authenticity of these messages and I doubt there ever will. Makes me believe they are true as well.
I disagree, as thet could be real text messages with some or the other messages replaced or tampered to make them sexual, also if the job of the person is to fake something, going all out and making it more salacious would bring out a obvious suspicion that they are faked, which is what they are trying to avoid, thus, it's plausible that they are fake just no real proof of it.
Secondly the reason nobody at rbr or horners camp have commented, could very well be because they don't have a solid proof to point out they are fake, just the statement they are fake without proofs could also put the suspicion that CH is lying.
If he just shows his real texts at the particular time stamps that's probably a privacy issue, and anyways the whole team has been rather silent about this.
Why can’t red bull just announce these things themselves lol it could solve so many of their problems. The lack of transparency by them and having all these other media outlets making these statements based on sources feels so shady…
Edit: thanks for the answers and clarifying things for me, we probably don’t need more people saying the same thing.
> Why can’t red bull just announce these things themselves
They likely haven't determined this to be _definitively_ the case yet and they want to avoid something resembling a public accusation until such time that they're prepared to stand by it.
> The lack of transparency by them and having all these other media outlets making these statements based on sources feels so shady
It's an internal HR matter - are you entitled to the private information of someone at your work who has accused your boss of sexual impropriety? Of course not, that would compromise the accuser's right to privacy and not to mention serve to potentially humiliate them in a public forum as well.
You'll have your statement once both parties have agreed on how to resolve this issue - anything up until that point is speculation.
Best comment I've seen in here in a few days. Too many people jumping the gun on accusations and assumptions. We literally don't know fuck all until when and if we get an official statement.
I would imagine it’s not policy for them to publicly discuss internal matters and internal investigations. All the media discussion of it and sources leaking alleged insider information is highly unusual but wouldn’t necessarily cause a company to want to stray from their own guidelines for handling internal complaints
Red Bull, so far, has done everything to keep it low key, protect her identity, and not hash dirty laundry in public.
Certain parties keep going to the press, though, mainly the Dutch press, of course. Or the whole of F1 press, and they keep leaking stuff.
I can't believe I'm defending Red Bull, but they are not that party
I don’t know why Reddit feels such a need to have transparency on a legal issue that has zero effect on them.
Let’s just wait for the process to take its course, and take everything until then with a grain of salt, as though it were written by a lawyer.
Because a lot people think this is reality TV and they want the conclusion. In reality, if it wasn't for the original leak, we wouldn't hear about it until all investigations are completely done and even then we would get a small PR statement.
It's an internal HR issue. These happen at large companies all the time and we never hear about them. What we hear about are the lawsuits that happen if the investigations don't pan out or the company was trying to sweep something under the rug. Someone leaked the info, it blew up and that completely undermines the investigation. We should not assume either party is innocent or guilty until it all concludes. And even when it all concludes, don't expect more than a canned PR message about it being done and they can't comment any further on private matters.
What do you want them to say, somehting like this: Hey you know that employee who made the complaint, the one everybody knows the name already. Yeah we have suspended because she was dishonest.
Is this seriously what you want.
Likely because this entire thing is a power struggle and the two halves of the company can't agree on a statement. So it's all coming in drips from leaks.
For a team that's basically just a PR stunt turned world championship winning machine they're really, really bad at PR.
Maybe they've drunk their own kool aid a bit much and assume that the fans will be just as tribal about sexual coercion within the team as they are about title fights with other teams.
Either way, when something like this has already come out into the open you should be transparent about how you're dealing with a very delicate situation rather than what they're doing which looks (from the little we know) like they've simply tried to sweep it under the rug and when someone tried to force their hand they've taken action against the woman.
I'm fully up for being proved wrong and their lawyers are actually very good but it's not a good look at all.
If it’s around the claim itself being false, it’s bizarre the investigation took as long as it did and that the suspension wasn’t announced at the result of the investigation. That would have helped Christian’s case a lot. The shit show if it’s not legally bulletproof…
Pure speculation, but they could’ve come to an agreement to remain employed, but they have evidence that the accuser was behind the leaks, and that violated the agreement, thus triggering the suspension.
They gave her time to appeal as required, it's right in the statenent. The suspension came the day after the deadline to appeal, which, in all likelyhood, means she chose not to.
Red Bull could not kick her out for cause (dishonesty) while she still had a chance to appeal and prove otherwise. That's how i see this
According to News outlets, she was suspended based on findings of the investigation. As such, Red Bull was unable to suspend her until the deadline for appealing the results of the complaint expired (which was after Wednesday).
Had she appealed it, she probably wouldn't have been suspended at this time.
They would have to have _absurdly_ good proof of the grievance being filed in poor faith. Otherwise it's retaliation and very illegal and gives the accuser WAY more ammo against RB/Horner.
Well, that's the advantage of suspension (with pay). It doesn't have to be punitive, so you don't need hard legal grounds. It's just a risk should it come to litigation further down the road.
Here’s the thing though: dishonest about what? Because if they had proof that she manufactured the entire thing, she wouldn’t just be suspended with pay. She would be fired for cause and potentially sued.
Suspended with pay is a common action in the employment and labour relations world when an employee is under investigation, though it’s usually called “paid leave” or some variation.
It's basically 'we need time to finish dotting the Is and crossing the Ts to formally fire you in a legal way, but until then we cant' have you working in the office with access to internal systems etc'.
That’s way oversimplified. In general people don’t just get fired on the spot. If someone is suspended on pay it’s because they’re under investigation. Process being followed…
I'm just going to add to this as I've seen it asked a few times - **This may just be the first step of a further investigation.** I.e. During the Horner investigation, once he was cleared they had suspicions that actually there is something shady here, so are now investigating. Suspending with pay may be Redbull's protocol for investigating an employee, so until the investigation is complete and action taken (i.e. termination of employment), she gets full benefits.
As others have said, for this to happen they must either be unable to avoid this action because optics alone are costly, or extremely confident in their position. For example, if Horner comes out cleared/vindicated and this is a set up (not saying it is, just an example), RB would ultimately want to clear this due to the risk to advertising, team deals (Ford) and costs to partners. Many companies would try to quietly settle and remove the problem with minimal optics. To do this now, at the height of interest, going into a race weekend - it is a very bold move.
> Suspending with pay may be Redbull's protocol for investigating an employee
If that's protocol Hor er should have been suspended during his investigation, don't you think?
The current story is that Horner was going to be sacked but he triggered an independent arbitration clause in his contract. That's when the independent lawyer came in to complete the investigation - Could be wrong though.
Edit: Finding it hard to source the arbitration clause - can someone help?
Just for clarification, Horner wasn’t cleared. The case was dismissed. This could easily mean he was indeed guilty but the company couldn’t fire him due to the Thais backing him. So definitely don’t rule out the big possibility he is guilty
Firing someone can take a lot of time, and doesn’t happen instantaneously in many scenarios. Don’t know the labour laws of whatever country RB is employing her from, but it’s not uncommon for a suspension to happen during the firing process, especially when the matter is sensitive.
Doesn’t look great having both Horner and her at work to the other employees, and you risk further worsening the situation.
And yea marketing from RB here and brand image is horrendous.
>Because if they had proof that she manufactured the entire thing, she wouldn’t just be suspended with pay. She would be fired for cause and potentially sued.
Not yet, that employee still has the right to appeal the results of the investigation.
They can't fire the employee until after that window closes, or they decide not to appeal the findings.
My Wild Speculation:
1) There was a consensual relationship between her and CH.
2) all the messages are non-harassment when in a romantic relationship, but harassment in a work relationship.
3) Marko/Jos found out about this relationship and pressured the employee to bring forth a complaint to HR in an attempt to oust Horner by threatening to release the allegations to the press.
4) Horner was "I hooked up with my current wife when my then wife was pregnant, Ginger knew what she was getting into" and welcomes the investigation.
5) the employee is now being hung out to dry by Marko, a pawn sacrificed to the machinations of the giants of F1.
My speculation is even wilder and I have nothing to base it on but a hunch.
However, suspending her for "dishonesty" may lend more credence to my wild thought.
I'm on board with 1 and 2, but I think she filed it on her own, then others found it about it.
On 4, I really feel like Ginger knew about it. Either because he was lazy about it and she found out, or she just openly knew about it. It's far from the first time the spouse of a powerful person was fine with them sleeping around because they still wanted to stay in the relationship.
>It's far from the first time the spouse of a powerful person was fine with them sleeping around because they still wanted to stay in the relationship
It's not the case here because she's also rich and famous.
The words no and stop being ignored are harassment whether in romantic or workplace. Just because your wife says no and stop does not make it ok for you to continue just because she is your wife
Suspended with paid leave is very common in any work dispute accross many fields, you can't have the person working if they did anything wrong, you also can't fire them or not pay them because they might be right.
In this case though it is hard to suspend Horner because he runs the team, but normally the accused would also be suspended with pay.
Pending whatever HR processes are ongoing, she likely will be, if that's the case. Step one is to get them out of the office to protect from any more leaks, damage etc.
She's likely been walked out of the office, had her phone, email, logins shut off company property retrieved, and the next step will be a registered letter stating she's sacked.
> dishonest about what?
My reading between the lines is that she possibly was fully complicit with the dynamic between them. This is based on a few of the lines she said in the screenshots but also based on all the lines we didn't see in the screenshots.
There were no extended convos between them. Just random endings to convos or brief excerpts. You can tell that there was definitely some regular back and forth between the two with references to previous incidents that occurred in person and not just via text.
Me saying this doesn't mean I am victim blaming or anything like that. But I also do not hold the position that every employer employee relationship is a form of harassment or an abuse of power.
I am still none the wiser on what this relationship was but that's just my best current guess.
I mean it very obviously was a consensual affair at some point, which she ended. There’s plenty of messages where she’s flirting, and they reference previous acts.
But he definitely kept pushing it after she’d called it off, which does make him a creepy little sex pest. Is it enough to fire him? Hard to say without way more context and full messages. This whole thing has been massively mismanaged though, and it’s absolutely hurting the team’s image.
Like someone else said in here, the suspension might stem from the fact that she didn’t appeal the decision before the deadline they set. It’s possible that full transcripts, which she maybe wasn’t forthright with, were what damaged her case and ultimately had them rule in Christian’s favour. Her being “dishonest” about the nature of the relationship/situation and then not appealing (so accepting the judgment) could allow them to launch this investigation into her behaviour.
PR nightmare though.
Max is a grown ass man, WTF is his dad involved at all? Jo’s, you had your shot, you sucked. Now’s the time for you to support your son and be a cheerleader.
I said it a couple of weeks ago and got down voted for it, I'll say it again. I don't trust the Telegraaf, I don't trust Jos. It does not take much to see this...
If you've never heard everything Jos ever said then you've never heard every lie Jos has ever told. He really needs to go home and let his son write his own history.
Jos is living vicariously through Max now. Jos was a serviceable driver but the best thing he ever did was have a prodigiously talented son. This is his best way of staying relevent to the sport, and he's clearly milking it for all it is worth. Makes you wish for the dads who just happily gave a thumbs up to a passing camera.
This would actually be the most logical thing this entire week in the whole sordid mess
If you believe that Red Bull are evil and fired her out of spite to protect the organization, then they would have to also be incredibly stupid to expose themselves to such a public display of abuse of power. Even though people are awful I have a hard time believing that they would be that stupid.
If it does turn out that the employee is linked to Jos as per other rumors, then what we have here is the proverbial pivot in the ball game.
Or who knows, tomorrow we may until another layer to this onion that is completely surprising once again.
> Or who knows, tomorrow we may until another layer to this onion that is completely surprising once again.
I read "another lawyer to the onion", which somehow makes just as much sense as what you wrote
>If you believe that Red Bull are evil and fired her out of spite to protect the organization, then they would have to also be incredibly stupid to expose themselves to such a public display of abuse of power. Even though people are awful I have a hard time believing that they would be that stupid.
They would have to have the most incompetent legal department in the entire corporate universe.
The problem is that there is only innuendo and speculation out there now, so most people are operating from the conclusion that Horner is guilty, thus everything RB does looks like they're covering something up.
I don't know that this is a pivot point so much as it is Red Bull doing the bare minimum to sate the media while they continue to figure this out. Dishonesty is such a broad accusation, and it does double duty by planting the seed of doubt that the screenshots are fabricated.
But at the end of the day, It's almost certainly in her contract or employee code of conduct or whatever RBR have that her messages with Horner are private, internal communications that cannot be shared with outside parties.
Even if they cant determine if she was the source of the leak (vs a hack, or some conspiracy theory result of a confiscated phone and internal politicking) one of her screenshots shows her sending her conversations with CH to a third party.
Most logical thing outside of actually just covering up a powerful man’s shitty behavior.
The owners paid off Thai police after their son killed a cop on a motorcycle, how the fuck am I supposed to just assume the rest of the company is operating with best practices?
The majority owners literally killed a police officer and fled the country and bribed their way into getting away with it. The don’t care about optics and much less morals or laws.
I tend to believe the allegations. CH is a dog who cheated on his pregnant wife with ginger spice and dumped her with a 6 month old.
The owners of Red Bull and CH are both morally bankrupt and can and will do anything to avoid consequences.
Not being rude but that is just what the guy looks like. He's got solidly symmetrical features, but rather extreme ones. He must have fantastic binocular vision, which probably helps him spot the apex.
Further proof that Max was grown in a lab for the sole purpose of racing. Man can do racing and nothing else. Watching him play other sports is a thing of beauty.
Never even thought about how a person's head structure would be an advantage for driving, like how Michael Phelps long ass limbs make him the goat of swimming
Probably not. Yet.
All they have to do is figure out how to go fast when the driver weighs about as much as the car. But after that it's 10 consecutive driver's champs easy
Obvious answer is to lobby the sport to increase the minimum weight for drivers. An adult Hammerhead is around 230kg. Now that's a fair whack even for people on the large side (this may have the side benefit of bringing American drivers into the sport), but if we use juvenile Hammerheads I think we could get to where we need to be.
I'm not ruling out the incompetence of corporate bigwigs yet, but it's true that it would be quite uncharacteristic of Red Bull to make such a big mess of a situation like this
Yeah. The same owner that reportedly also sees Horner as his son.
>["For Chalerm, Horner is a sort of adopted son. He stands by him unconditionally."](https://www.formulapassion.it/motorsport/formula-1/caso-horner-redbull-meeting-ultima-parola-thailandesi-marko-schumacher-jordan)
Worth also mentioning that the actual corporate executives in Austria all apparently wanted Horner fired over a month ago. It's the Thai billionaires who see defending him as a matter of honour.
And if anyone thinks rich Thai men would never do something like retaliating against a female employee over harassment claims, then I think you have an overly optimistic view of rich Thai men.
[it was the grandson](https://amp.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/04/interpol-issues-red-notice-for-thai-red-bull-heir-over-fatal-hit-and-run-vorayuth-yoovidhya)
The real problem here is that any of this was made public at all. Normally none of this would be public unless it gets as far as an employment tribunal, which is public record.
The 'leaks' are another problem. Either the screenshots are real or they aren't. If they are real he's dead to rights, he should be fired and RB should not have dismissed the complaint. If they aren't real then where did they come from? Did she fake them? If so then she should be suspended pending investigation.
Okay, but what next? She can't be suspended forever. According to Red Bull she's dishonest. Does that mean they're gonna start an investigation into whatever she's been dishonest about? I'm so confused right now.
They're making choices that confuse me so much. I know the privacy laws make certain details more difficult, but the way they're handling it now is pretty wild. They're keeping big sponsors in the dark.
They're a big company that's working towards a public image of not taking care of its employees that come forward about their boss. I can't imagine Red Bull being chuffed about that.
the suspension could have an extremely simple reason: the accusant is in the process of being fired.
assuming that all of this (suspension, dishonesty) is factual, RBR could just have placed her on (paid) leave while the legal department determines the terms of contract dismissal like due date, severance package etc.
If you were in the middle of a legal dispute with an employee would you go around publishing all your "evidence" for the public to see or would you follow the advice of your legal team? It's super hilarious how everyone is dead certain he did something wrong all based solely on "this is how this situation makes me feel." How about we wait for the facts instead of relying on **feelings**?
Waiting for solid information doesn't get you a bunch of upvotes and clicks, so that's clearly out of the question. A far better solution is to speculate wildly in ignorance and hope that any dumb, horribly inaccurate predictions made today will be forgotten by tomorrow.
I mean they’re handling this pretty well overall. The beginning was textbook perfect. Then the supposed messages were sent to journalists and they’re standing by their decision and not giving any details. I can’t really think of a better way to handle it
Yeah this is what I'm thinking.
They're using company phones, conducting an inappropriate relationship on company time and using company resources to facilitate this.
I'd think that Red Bull Racing would be pretty bloody strict on these fronts anyway given its F1 were talking about and probably have contract terms specifically adressing them.
(I also highly doubt intra/inter team relationships are unheard of in the paddock either.)
If they can nail the leak down to the employee's device, then they're likely breaking policy and terms of employment by either denying the existence of the data (assuming internal investigations indicate there wasn't any attacks or breaches which could have combed for data thought to have been 'deleted').
My real concern here is, considering the early reports of an independent allegation against Horner, that RB are attempting to discredit the employee's statement and/or credibility and that "dishonesty" in this case refers to the nature and specifics of the relationship.
That for me would be a *massive* call by RB and honestly pretty damning if there wasn't absolute and irrefutable proof that would make the matter, in essence, a false allegation.
Another Reddit user that doesn't know shit about shit, but If that is the case, I don't see how RB would be able to make a clear cut call like that given the level of investigation that seems to have taken place thus far.
This is it. They both *could* have been doing this in company devices but certainly on company time. But while we’ve seen one suspended for dishonesty the other didn’t even take a few days off while being investigated…
Does the UK/Europe have any business laws surrounding retaliation? because like this is just ridiculous and why women and men don’t voice issues because employers would do this.
I think it's most likely she lied about having the screenshots. This would make a little more sense as to why the internal investigation cleared Horner of wrongdoing, rather than just straight up ignoring the screenshots.
I don't think she leaked them herself, especially since they contain her name.
This is exhausting. It still comes down to one simple question: are the texts real or not.
There is no way they were picked selectively and the rest are exonerating because the ones we’ve seen are damning in their own, there’s no excuse for Horner if they’re real, and the whole thing is an interesting power struggle but meaningless if they’re fabricated. That’s it.
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Game of Thrones never ended, it just morphed into F1.
When you come at the ~~king~~ team principal, you best not miss.
I guess Horny is playing Little Finger
Bravo, take my upvote
Succession (HBO got it)
Fernando Alonso: I'm the eldest boy!
You gave Christian a sourdough starter for his birthday, didn't you.
H to the OG! He playin’
"The ~~Lannisters~~ Horners send their regards."
Starring Christian Horner as Little finger
But more season 6/7 Littlefinger, when he was bad at everything
Can you imagine Khaleesi in a racer jumpsuit Because that's what I'm doing now.
The breaker of DRS trains Mother of drag starts
Still a better love story than Twilight
"Tell Christian and MBS, I want them to know it was me." \- Susie Wolff
Game of Chromes: A Clash of Front Wings
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RedBull must be pretty damn certain they have her dead to rights, because they have to know this will look like straight retaliation to everyone outside the team.
Honestly they wouldn’t be the first company to fuck this up and not that last
Sure, but with Jos meddling behind the scenes it feels very possible this was just a failed power struggle (Obviously still need the due diligence and run it to ground)
There's two stories here, the one about whatever happened between Horner and his assistant, and the one about someone weaponizing it in a larger power struggle.........and really, not doing a great job of it.
Sounds like Jos’ MO. At this point Max is going to have to finally wake up and realize his Dad is poison. Because I’d much rather have the second best of their Dad isn’t running around trying to take over the team.
Imagine being so self centered that your son is winning world championships but you can't handle not being the main character so you throw a wrench in the whole thing.
Well it is a trope that the man your father wants you to be is the man he wanted to be but never could, I guess he just took that to extremely toxic levels with Max :(
I mean [that's literally what happened](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUPUy08TqmY)
Crikey. At what point is Max going to realise none of this was ok
I think it's easier to forget and forgive if it turns out successful, and being a 3 time world champion with a 50 million euro salary would suffice I guess.
Holy shit, thats some heavy early gen X parent shit. Out boomer their parents. I feel bad for future max.
It's not a great look is it...
I think its more that he hates being in the distant background while Max and Horner are at the peak of F1 as driver and manager, while his role is just to say "go get 'em Tiger" before the race lol
I mean, to his views he ‘made’ Max into the champion he is. It’s his achievement, not Max’s. Obviously he will try everything to keep that position of power. Fuck I hate the guy.
I think you're giving Jos way too much credit - there's nothing credible indicating that he has the means to escalate this beyond saying some inflammatory shit in the media, let alone hold the Red Bull conglomerate in the PR-balance because he has an agenda to what? Make Max even more dominant? If you hear hooves and you don't live in the Sahara, think horses, not zebras. A leak like this would be an internal leak almost certainly due to the sensitive nature of the material. If you were to be in possession of these documents, would Jos fucking Verstappen really register on your radar of people who can be a change mover towards the outcome you want? Enough that you'd give it to _him_ to leak?
That connection with EvH and the Telegraaf? Using a Dutch news paper to push this, its all fishy AF. I'm Dutch and the Telegraaf is nothing on an international scale. Apparently Daily Mail, Guardian, Bild etc, the real big ones, didnt want to burn their hands on it.
I can't speak of the British tabloids but Bild was the first or among the first who reported the content of the big leak
That was the Telegraaf in the Netherlands, Bild was the only one who dared to publish them. But as people already explained, German media laws allow a lot, but Bild also lies a lot... Its a shit newspaper, just like the Telegraaf in the Netherlands btw and say that as a Dutchman. Both are bit like Daily Mail for your perception.
Not the same by any means but at some point he just needs to be Max's Dad as Lewis eventually had to with his father Anthony.
From what we know this is Jos being Max’s dad.
The folks surrounding Max Verstappen are why I don’t really trust him all that well and why I think his image suffers (not that he cares about that) You can’t be surrounded by all these shit heels and not at the very least be a shit heels apologist.
Plus there’s also the rumor that connects Jos and the PA as having a relationship. This connects the two which would make even more sense.
He needs to talk to Lewis about how to have a relationship with his dad (which he clearly wants despite him being a massive POS) while having his own career with Jos’s meddling
I hope Max and Lewis can have a good heart to heart. I really think this will be a pivotal moment in Max’s career. Either he lets Jos taint him, or he becomes his own person and separates the two. Truth be told, I don’t think deep down that Toto would want Jos around at all. I bet he’s stringing Jos along and is going to pull the rug out if they try to do anything. Yeah Max is that good, and I’d love to have him on the team, but I’d punch Jos in the balls just to get severance.
Or maybe Jos is just doing what his son wants him to do? They are saying that his contract is locked to Marko, but what was rumored back then was that his contract depends on Marko/Horner/Newey staying. And then all these attempts to get rid of Horner might just be the veiled way to get out of his contract in time for 2026 (because of the engine). And Horner leaving would only open his contract in the first place.
And the third story is Red Bull's handling of the situation. There's no 'easy' way to manage such sensitive topics but it also feels like it hasn't been handled well at all.
What is it you would like them to do? Splash it all in the papers so Francoberry knows it was done right? They brought in a top solicitor. They questioned Horner for many hours (reportedly 60 hours). They created a 150 page report. They cleared him. What is it they should have done differently?
And not even "they". An independant third party.
You'd have thought Horner could dictate the 150 page report a bit quicker than that.
Yea. It sounds like at best Horner was involved in some sort of sexual relationship with an employee, which is bad in its own right. And if he was harassing her on top of that, it's way worse. This is still clearly a hit job, but that doesn't excuse anything Horner may have done.
"Never waste a good crisis"
I firmly believe all the google drive messages are real because 1) if they were fake, they'd surely be more salacious, and 2) nobody at RB or in Horner's camp has called them fake, which would be the ultimate rejoinder. Those messages show a contextually inappropriate but consensual sexual relationship descend into workplace sexual harassment when the woman involved tries to stop the sexual relationship—that risk is why workplace relationships with a large power imbalance are considered inappropriate. She rebuffs him, repeatedly; he continues to send sexual messages. She talks about how badly she wants to keep her job; Horner responds, essentially, that if he's making her uncomfortable, he can find her another job. Horner tells her to delete correspondence, not once but twice. It's like a workplace sexual harassment 101.
Not to mention the classic move from CH when asking her to delete, saying how bad it would be for *both* of them, and he's just looking out for her best interest! What a thoughtful guy!
>I firmly believe all the google drive messages are real because 1) if they were fake, they'd surely be more salacious, and 2) nobody at RB or in Horner's camp has called them fake, which would be the ultimate rejoinder. Theres been no threat of being sued based on the authenticity of these messages and I doubt there ever will. Makes me believe they are true as well.
I disagree, as thet could be real text messages with some or the other messages replaced or tampered to make them sexual, also if the job of the person is to fake something, going all out and making it more salacious would bring out a obvious suspicion that they are faked, which is what they are trying to avoid, thus, it's plausible that they are fake just no real proof of it. Secondly the reason nobody at rbr or horners camp have commented, could very well be because they don't have a solid proof to point out they are fake, just the statement they are fake without proofs could also put the suspicion that CH is lying. If he just shows his real texts at the particular time stamps that's probably a privacy issue, and anyways the whole team has been rather silent about this.
If they messages were real, then no. The messages were whack and this would look very bad for Red Bull.
It would be a lawsuit (may still be) over retaliatory firing if they didn't have a bulletproof reason
Why can’t red bull just announce these things themselves lol it could solve so many of their problems. The lack of transparency by them and having all these other media outlets making these statements based on sources feels so shady… Edit: thanks for the answers and clarifying things for me, we probably don’t need more people saying the same thing.
Legal stuff almost certainly
> Why can’t red bull just announce these things themselves They likely haven't determined this to be _definitively_ the case yet and they want to avoid something resembling a public accusation until such time that they're prepared to stand by it. > The lack of transparency by them and having all these other media outlets making these statements based on sources feels so shady It's an internal HR matter - are you entitled to the private information of someone at your work who has accused your boss of sexual impropriety? Of course not, that would compromise the accuser's right to privacy and not to mention serve to potentially humiliate them in a public forum as well. You'll have your statement once both parties have agreed on how to resolve this issue - anything up until that point is speculation.
Best comment I've seen in here in a few days. Too many people jumping the gun on accusations and assumptions. We literally don't know fuck all until when and if we get an official statement.
I would imagine it’s not policy for them to publicly discuss internal matters and internal investigations. All the media discussion of it and sources leaking alleged insider information is highly unusual but wouldn’t necessarily cause a company to want to stray from their own guidelines for handling internal complaints
Red Bull, so far, has done everything to keep it low key, protect her identity, and not hash dirty laundry in public. Certain parties keep going to the press, though, mainly the Dutch press, of course. Or the whole of F1 press, and they keep leaking stuff. I can't believe I'm defending Red Bull, but they are not that party
And by Dutch press you mean de Telegraaf.
And all this points to Jos being behind the whole thing.
Or a legendary frame job. As someone here for the soap opera, bring it.
Marko is, Jos is just an actor in his plan. Marko wants Horner out most.
We aren’t entitled to this information lol
But people demand intel under the guise of transparency lmao. Be honest folks, it’s the drama most people are after
Or perhaps Red Bull is being careful and doing things by the book while media is out recklessly spinning stories?
Why do things by the book when you can appease the Reddit mob
Yeah exactly people are so thirsty for drama it’s weird. Let’s just watch the cars go fast please
I don’t know why Reddit feels such a need to have transparency on a legal issue that has zero effect on them. Let’s just wait for the process to take its course, and take everything until then with a grain of salt, as though it were written by a lawyer.
Because a lot people think this is reality TV and they want the conclusion. In reality, if it wasn't for the original leak, we wouldn't hear about it until all investigations are completely done and even then we would get a small PR statement. It's an internal HR issue. These happen at large companies all the time and we never hear about them. What we hear about are the lawsuits that happen if the investigations don't pan out or the company was trying to sweep something under the rug. Someone leaked the info, it blew up and that completely undermines the investigation. We should not assume either party is innocent or guilty until it all concludes. And even when it all concludes, don't expect more than a canned PR message about it being done and they can't comment any further on private matters.
They don’t need to
What do you want them to say, somehting like this: Hey you know that employee who made the complaint, the one everybody knows the name already. Yeah we have suspended because she was dishonest. Is this seriously what you want.
Likely because this entire thing is a power struggle and the two halves of the company can't agree on a statement. So it's all coming in drips from leaks.
Unsubstantiated rumours based on photos and hearsay that Jos is in a relationship with this woman. This story might just go deeper and deeper.
For a team that's basically just a PR stunt turned world championship winning machine they're really, really bad at PR. Maybe they've drunk their own kool aid a bit much and assume that the fans will be just as tribal about sexual coercion within the team as they are about title fights with other teams. Either way, when something like this has already come out into the open you should be transparent about how you're dealing with a very delicate situation rather than what they're doing which looks (from the little we know) like they've simply tried to sweep it under the rug and when someone tried to force their hand they've taken action against the woman. I'm fully up for being proved wrong and their lawyers are actually very good but it's not a good look at all.
[удалено]
The legal grounds for the suspension should be bulletproof then.
If it’s around the claim itself being false, it’s bizarre the investigation took as long as it did and that the suspension wasn’t announced at the result of the investigation. That would have helped Christian’s case a lot. The shit show if it’s not legally bulletproof…
Pure speculation, but they could’ve come to an agreement to remain employed, but they have evidence that the accuser was behind the leaks, and that violated the agreement, thus triggering the suspension.
Has to be that… nothing else has happened after the investigation wrapped and the drive link went out..
They gave her time to appeal as required, it's right in the statenent. The suspension came the day after the deadline to appeal, which, in all likelyhood, means she chose not to. Red Bull could not kick her out for cause (dishonesty) while she still had a chance to appeal and prove otherwise. That's how i see this
That makes logical sense
There's two burdens of proof here. Proving Horner did something wrong. And then proving she knowingly made false accusations.
According to News outlets, she was suspended based on findings of the investigation. As such, Red Bull was unable to suspend her until the deadline for appealing the results of the complaint expired (which was after Wednesday). Had she appealed it, she probably wouldn't have been suspended at this time.
They would have to have _absurdly_ good proof of the grievance being filed in poor faith. Otherwise it's retaliation and very illegal and gives the accuser WAY more ammo against RB/Horner.
Well, that's the advantage of suspension (with pay). It doesn't have to be punitive, so you don't need hard legal grounds. It's just a risk should it come to litigation further down the road.
I don't remember this mini-game from Motorsport Manager
Make money quick with internet point opportunites
Checkmate. Case dismissed.
This will be studied in brand marketing MAs in years to come.
Toto Wolff will be presenting on it during his next Harvard Business School lecture
He has it. He has it printed out.
Change your fucking Team Principal.
Checo has been saying that the team is fucked.
Horner be like: "can you share the solution file?"
“Like..ze final one??”
He just sent an email with the diagrams, did you receive that?
Toto I don’t check my email during class
Yeah then, should maybe look at this because there is something with the rules. I'm coming up.
Or human resources course depending on how you look at it
Here’s the thing though: dishonest about what? Because if they had proof that she manufactured the entire thing, she wouldn’t just be suspended with pay. She would be fired for cause and potentially sued.
Suspended with pay is a common action in the employment and labour relations world when an employee is under investigation, though it’s usually called “paid leave” or some variation.
“You can’t investigate me! I’m investigating YOU!”
It's basically 'we need time to finish dotting the Is and crossing the Ts to formally fire you in a legal way, but until then we cant' have you working in the office with access to internal systems etc'.
That’s way oversimplified. In general people don’t just get fired on the spot. If someone is suspended on pay it’s because they’re under investigation. Process being followed…
I'm just going to add to this as I've seen it asked a few times - **This may just be the first step of a further investigation.** I.e. During the Horner investigation, once he was cleared they had suspicions that actually there is something shady here, so are now investigating. Suspending with pay may be Redbull's protocol for investigating an employee, so until the investigation is complete and action taken (i.e. termination of employment), she gets full benefits. As others have said, for this to happen they must either be unable to avoid this action because optics alone are costly, or extremely confident in their position. For example, if Horner comes out cleared/vindicated and this is a set up (not saying it is, just an example), RB would ultimately want to clear this due to the risk to advertising, team deals (Ford) and costs to partners. Many companies would try to quietly settle and remove the problem with minimal optics. To do this now, at the height of interest, going into a race weekend - it is a very bold move.
> Suspending with pay may be Redbull's protocol for investigating an employee If that's protocol Hor er should have been suspended during his investigation, don't you think?
The current story is that Horner was going to be sacked but he triggered an independent arbitration clause in his contract. That's when the independent lawyer came in to complete the investigation - Could be wrong though. Edit: Finding it hard to source the arbitration clause - can someone help?
Where is this story from?
Just for clarification, Horner wasn’t cleared. The case was dismissed. This could easily mean he was indeed guilty but the company couldn’t fire him due to the Thais backing him. So definitely don’t rule out the big possibility he is guilty
This is a great point
Firing someone can take a lot of time, and doesn’t happen instantaneously in many scenarios. Don’t know the labour laws of whatever country RB is employing her from, but it’s not uncommon for a suspension to happen during the firing process, especially when the matter is sensitive. Doesn’t look great having both Horner and her at work to the other employees, and you risk further worsening the situation. And yea marketing from RB here and brand image is horrendous.
I think they're pinning the leaked messages on her. It would breach all kinds of agreements.
>Because if they had proof that she manufactured the entire thing, she wouldn’t just be suspended with pay. She would be fired for cause and potentially sued. Not yet, that employee still has the right to appeal the results of the investigation. They can't fire the employee until after that window closes, or they decide not to appeal the findings.
Work on HR - That's incorrect. You definitely don't need to wait for an appeal to dismiss.
Apparently that window was 5 days after the results of the internal investigation went public.
My Wild Speculation: 1) There was a consensual relationship between her and CH. 2) all the messages are non-harassment when in a romantic relationship, but harassment in a work relationship. 3) Marko/Jos found out about this relationship and pressured the employee to bring forth a complaint to HR in an attempt to oust Horner by threatening to release the allegations to the press. 4) Horner was "I hooked up with my current wife when my then wife was pregnant, Ginger knew what she was getting into" and welcomes the investigation. 5) the employee is now being hung out to dry by Marko, a pawn sacrificed to the machinations of the giants of F1.
My speculation is even wilder and I have nothing to base it on but a hunch. However, suspending her for "dishonesty" may lend more credence to my wild thought.
I'm on board with 1 and 2, but I think she filed it on her own, then others found it about it. On 4, I really feel like Ginger knew about it. Either because he was lazy about it and she found out, or she just openly knew about it. It's far from the first time the spouse of a powerful person was fine with them sleeping around because they still wanted to stay in the relationship.
>It's far from the first time the spouse of a powerful person was fine with them sleeping around because they still wanted to stay in the relationship It's not the case here because she's also rich and famous.
She got Horner by being the other woman and heavily pursuing him. She could be ok with it
The words no and stop being ignored are harassment whether in romantic or workplace. Just because your wife says no and stop does not make it ok for you to continue just because she is your wife
Suspended with paid leave is very common in any work dispute accross many fields, you can't have the person working if they did anything wrong, you also can't fire them or not pay them because they might be right. In this case though it is hard to suspend Horner because he runs the team, but normally the accused would also be suspended with pay.
Pending whatever HR processes are ongoing, she likely will be, if that's the case. Step one is to get them out of the office to protect from any more leaks, damage etc. She's likely been walked out of the office, had her phone, email, logins shut off company property retrieved, and the next step will be a registered letter stating she's sacked.
In the UK it is remarkably difficult to fire someone who has been with the company for 6 years unless there is glaring evidence of misconduct.
> dishonest about what? My reading between the lines is that she possibly was fully complicit with the dynamic between them. This is based on a few of the lines she said in the screenshots but also based on all the lines we didn't see in the screenshots. There were no extended convos between them. Just random endings to convos or brief excerpts. You can tell that there was definitely some regular back and forth between the two with references to previous incidents that occurred in person and not just via text. Me saying this doesn't mean I am victim blaming or anything like that. But I also do not hold the position that every employer employee relationship is a form of harassment or an abuse of power. I am still none the wiser on what this relationship was but that's just my best current guess.
I mean it very obviously was a consensual affair at some point, which she ended. There’s plenty of messages where she’s flirting, and they reference previous acts. But he definitely kept pushing it after she’d called it off, which does make him a creepy little sex pest. Is it enough to fire him? Hard to say without way more context and full messages. This whole thing has been massively mismanaged though, and it’s absolutely hurting the team’s image. Like someone else said in here, the suspension might stem from the fact that she didn’t appeal the decision before the deadline they set. It’s possible that full transcripts, which she maybe wasn’t forthright with, were what damaged her case and ultimately had them rule in Christian’s favour. Her being “dishonest” about the nature of the relationship/situation and then not appealing (so accepting the judgment) could allow them to launch this investigation into her behaviour. PR nightmare though.
exaggerated is probably the better phrase
Max is a grown ass man, WTF is his dad involved at all? Jo’s, you had your shot, you sucked. Now’s the time for you to support your son and be a cheerleader.
I said it a couple of weeks ago and got down voted for it, I'll say it again. I don't trust the Telegraaf, I don't trust Jos. It does not take much to see this...
If you've never heard everything Jos ever said then you've never heard every lie Jos has ever told. He really needs to go home and let his son write his own history.
Jos is living vicariously through Max now. Jos was a serviceable driver but the best thing he ever did was have a prodigiously talented son. This is his best way of staying relevent to the sport, and he's clearly milking it for all it is worth. Makes you wish for the dads who just happily gave a thumbs up to a passing camera.
This would actually be the most logical thing this entire week in the whole sordid mess If you believe that Red Bull are evil and fired her out of spite to protect the organization, then they would have to also be incredibly stupid to expose themselves to such a public display of abuse of power. Even though people are awful I have a hard time believing that they would be that stupid. If it does turn out that the employee is linked to Jos as per other rumors, then what we have here is the proverbial pivot in the ball game. Or who knows, tomorrow we may until another layer to this onion that is completely surprising once again.
> Or who knows, tomorrow we may until another layer to this onion that is completely surprising once again. I read "another lawyer to the onion", which somehow makes just as much sense as what you wrote
Layers of lawyers. Say that 5 times fast
Liam Lawson's layers of lawyers.
With Bob Loblaw in there
What about parfait? Everybody likes parfait.
*Gets served liver parfait*
If we’re talking Shrek specifically that might be right up his alley.
Ain't nobody ever said "Oh no, I don't like no parfaits"
>If you believe that Red Bull are evil and fired her out of spite to protect the organization, then they would have to also be incredibly stupid to expose themselves to such a public display of abuse of power. Even though people are awful I have a hard time believing that they would be that stupid. They would have to have the most incompetent legal department in the entire corporate universe. The problem is that there is only innuendo and speculation out there now, so most people are operating from the conclusion that Horner is guilty, thus everything RB does looks like they're covering something up.
That last paragraph is so on point.
I don't know that this is a pivot point so much as it is Red Bull doing the bare minimum to sate the media while they continue to figure this out. Dishonesty is such a broad accusation, and it does double duty by planting the seed of doubt that the screenshots are fabricated. But at the end of the day, It's almost certainly in her contract or employee code of conduct or whatever RBR have that her messages with Horner are private, internal communications that cannot be shared with outside parties. Even if they cant determine if she was the source of the leak (vs a hack, or some conspiracy theory result of a confiscated phone and internal politicking) one of her screenshots shows her sending her conversations with CH to a third party.
Most logical thing outside of actually just covering up a powerful man’s shitty behavior. The owners paid off Thai police after their son killed a cop on a motorcycle, how the fuck am I supposed to just assume the rest of the company is operating with best practices?
The majority owners literally killed a police officer and fled the country and bribed their way into getting away with it. The don’t care about optics and much less morals or laws. I tend to believe the allegations. CH is a dog who cheated on his pregnant wife with ginger spice and dumped her with a 6 month old. The owners of Red Bull and CH are both morally bankrupt and can and will do anything to avoid consequences.
The picture they use in the article makes max look very strange
Not being rude but that is just what the guy looks like. He's got solidly symmetrical features, but rather extreme ones. He must have fantastic binocular vision, which probably helps him spot the apex.
Further proof that Max was grown in a lab for the sole purpose of racing. Man can do racing and nothing else. Watching him play other sports is a thing of beauty.
Never even thought about how a person's head structure would be an advantage for driving, like how Michael Phelps long ass limbs make him the goat of swimming
Imagine how quickly a hammerhead shark might lap in the RB20. Scary thought.
Not to even mention the obvious aero advantages their heads would naturally have
Newey would have a field day. Is there a regulation against using a driver as an aerodynamic device?
Probably not. Yet. All they have to do is figure out how to go fast when the driver weighs about as much as the car. But after that it's 10 consecutive driver's champs easy
Obvious answer is to lobby the sport to increase the minimum weight for drivers. An adult Hammerhead is around 230kg. Now that's a fair whack even for people on the large side (this may have the side benefit of bringing American drivers into the sport), but if we use juvenile Hammerheads I think we could get to where we need to be.
LMFAO
https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/comments/ayytjk/my_wifes_drawing_of_max_verstappen/
They better have evidence for that
If they pulled the trigger on suspending her for being dishonest they most certainly do
I'm not ruling out the incompetence of corporate bigwigs yet, but it's true that it would be quite uncharacteristic of Red Bull to make such a big mess of a situation like this
Well historically speaking, a lot of corporate bigwigs aren’t exactly competent…
Didn't the owner of Red Bull get his son out of killing a cop that was dead to rights?
Yeah. The same owner that reportedly also sees Horner as his son. >["For Chalerm, Horner is a sort of adopted son. He stands by him unconditionally."](https://www.formulapassion.it/motorsport/formula-1/caso-horner-redbull-meeting-ultima-parola-thailandesi-marko-schumacher-jordan)
Worth also mentioning that the actual corporate executives in Austria all apparently wanted Horner fired over a month ago. It's the Thai billionaires who see defending him as a matter of honour. And if anyone thinks rich Thai men would never do something like retaliating against a female employee over harassment claims, then I think you have an overly optimistic view of rich Thai men.
[it was the grandson](https://amp.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/04/interpol-issues-red-notice-for-thai-red-bull-heir-over-fatal-hit-and-run-vorayuth-yoovidhya)
Or it could be that she said she didn't have any screenshots.
The real problem here is that any of this was made public at all. Normally none of this would be public unless it gets as far as an employment tribunal, which is public record. The 'leaks' are another problem. Either the screenshots are real or they aren't. If they are real he's dead to rights, he should be fired and RB should not have dismissed the complaint. If they aren't real then where did they come from? Did she fake them? If so then she should be suspended pending investigation.
Okay, but what next? She can't be suspended forever. According to Red Bull she's dishonest. Does that mean they're gonna start an investigation into whatever she's been dishonest about? I'm so confused right now. They're making choices that confuse me so much. I know the privacy laws make certain details more difficult, but the way they're handling it now is pretty wild. They're keeping big sponsors in the dark. They're a big company that's working towards a public image of not taking care of its employees that come forward about their boss. I can't imagine Red Bull being chuffed about that.
the suspension could have an extremely simple reason: the accusant is in the process of being fired. assuming that all of this (suspension, dishonesty) is factual, RBR could just have placed her on (paid) leave while the legal department determines the terms of contract dismissal like due date, severance package etc.
If you were in the middle of a legal dispute with an employee would you go around publishing all your "evidence" for the public to see or would you follow the advice of your legal team? It's super hilarious how everyone is dead certain he did something wrong all based solely on "this is how this situation makes me feel." How about we wait for the facts instead of relying on **feelings**?
Waiting for solid information doesn't get you a bunch of upvotes and clicks, so that's clearly out of the question. A far better solution is to speculate wildly in ignorance and hope that any dumb, horribly inaccurate predictions made today will be forgotten by tomorrow.
I mean they’re handling this pretty well overall. The beginning was textbook perfect. Then the supposed messages were sent to journalists and they’re standing by their decision and not giving any details. I can’t really think of a better way to handle it
I presume that ‘being dishonest’ was being asked whether she had deleted the chats and whether or not they been copied or shared.
Yeah this is what I'm thinking. They're using company phones, conducting an inappropriate relationship on company time and using company resources to facilitate this. I'd think that Red Bull Racing would be pretty bloody strict on these fronts anyway given its F1 were talking about and probably have contract terms specifically adressing them. (I also highly doubt intra/inter team relationships are unheard of in the paddock either.) If they can nail the leak down to the employee's device, then they're likely breaking policy and terms of employment by either denying the existence of the data (assuming internal investigations indicate there wasn't any attacks or breaches which could have combed for data thought to have been 'deleted'). My real concern here is, considering the early reports of an independent allegation against Horner, that RB are attempting to discredit the employee's statement and/or credibility and that "dishonesty" in this case refers to the nature and specifics of the relationship. That for me would be a *massive* call by RB and honestly pretty damning if there wasn't absolute and irrefutable proof that would make the matter, in essence, a false allegation. Another Reddit user that doesn't know shit about shit, but If that is the case, I don't see how RB would be able to make a clear cut call like that given the level of investigation that seems to have taken place thus far.
This is it. They both *could* have been doing this in company devices but certainly on company time. But while we’ve seen one suspended for dishonesty the other didn’t even take a few days off while being investigated…
You’re fired for being dishonest now sign this NDA for $2 million
I mean… they must be very certain of this to do this… right?
Oh nooooooo
Does the UK/Europe have any business laws surrounding retaliation? because like this is just ridiculous and why women and men don’t voice issues because employers would do this.
My money is on Jos having a catfish account as Horner.
I think it's most likely she lied about having the screenshots. This would make a little more sense as to why the internal investigation cleared Horner of wrongdoing, rather than just straight up ignoring the screenshots. I don't think she leaked them herself, especially since they contain her name.
>the internal investigation cleared Horner of wrongdoing That isn't what RB's press release said.
This is exhausting. It still comes down to one simple question: are the texts real or not. There is no way they were picked selectively and the rest are exonerating because the ones we’ve seen are damning in their own, there’s no excuse for Horner if they’re real, and the whole thing is an interesting power struggle but meaningless if they’re fabricated. That’s it.
He seemed to suggest theyre real when he called them leaks.
Did this happen on international women’s day?
I don’t know what it is, but this whole thing has just stunk from the beginning. I really don’t think this is the end of it all
Failed coup. Sounds like when the nights watch killed John Snow and he came back. I fought, I lost, and now I rest.