Lizzo and her Big Grrrl Big Touring company have been sued by another former employee in a lawsuit that alleges, among other things, racial and sexual harassment, assault and illegal retaliatory termination.
The plaintiff this time is Asha Daniels, a clothing designer who worked on Lizzo's recent tour. Her lawsuit principally targets the wardrobe manager on that tour, Amanda Nomura, but also makes more general allegations about the working practices put in place by Lizzo and her management team.
This follows the lawsuit filed last month by three former member's of Lizzo's dance team, which also made allegations of sexual harassment, and which claimed that the three dancers were forced to endure a hostile work environment
In the new lawsuit, Daniels says that - given how Lizzo talks about diversity and positivity in public - she was expecting to be working in a “healthy, diverse environment with virtues of respect and empowerment of women. Unfortunately, the opposite turned out to be true".
Daniels, a black woman, claims that she was forced to hear “racist and fatphobic comments from Nomura”, while witnessing her “mock both Lizzo and Lizzo’s background dancers on multiple occasions".
Honing in on one specific incident, Daniels describes how - in February - Nomura rolled a heavy rack of clothing over the plaintiff's foot, causing considerable pain.
When Daniels tried to sit down to deal with that pain, Nomura "proceeded to shove plaintiff into the rack of clothing". And then, the next day, Daniels was told that she wasn't allowed to wear more comfortable shoes that would minimise the pain from the previous day's injury.
Echoing complaints made in the earlier lawsuit filed by Lizzo's dancers, Daniels also says that those working on the tour were pressured to attend social gatherings where nudity and sexuality were a focal point. Plus, on one occasion, images of male genitalia were inappropriately shared on a group text sent to the tour crew, but "Lizzo's management found the image to be comical".
Daniels says she ultimately made a formal complaint to tour manager Carlina Gugliotta, who was apologetic and confirmed that everyone knew "Nomura is crazy". But, Gugliotta added, Nomura was too hard to replace, and now wanted Daniels to be removed from the tour for "speaking up". Daniels was then fired.
Lizzo has strongly denied all the allegations made in the first lawsuit. But lawyers working on both cases say that "we’ve heard from more than two dozen former Lizzo employees sharing similar stories of abuse and harassment".
And while many of the complaints are specifically made against senior staff on the musician's tour, "Lizzo certainly knows what’s going on but chooses not to put an end to this disgusting and illegal conduct and participates herself".