Meta sued for over $1 million after manager refused to back employee’s green card petition

A former Meta manager has sued the Facebook parent, alleging he was fired after refusing to sign a reference letter supporting an employee’s US green card petition because he believed some of the claims in it were inaccurate or unsupported.

James Tillinghast and his wife, Nancy Cuddy Tillinghast, filed the lawsuit against Meta Platforms, Tillinghast’s former manager Bolan Wang and unnamed defendants in the US District Court for the District of New Jersey on August 17. The lawsuit accuses Meta of retaliation, wrongful discharge and other violations. The allegations have not been proven in court.

At the centre of the case is an I-140 petition for an EB-2 National Interest Waiver (NIW) for Shenxun Wang, a Meta employee who worked in Tillinghast’s product-design organisation.


According to the complaint, Meta’s outside immigration law firm, Fragomen, Del Rey, Bernsen & Loewy, prepared or substantially prepared a managerial reference letter and asked Tillinghast to provide his credentials, supervisory knowledge and signature.

What the Meta manager objected to

The proposed letter attributed about $638 million in incremental advertising revenue to Wang, according to the lawsuit.

Tillinghast alleges he did not have a factual basis to say that Wang had personally generated or should be credited with that amount. He also claims the draft stated or implied that Wang had created algorithms or artificial intelligence tools. Tillinghast said he understood Wang’s role to be mainly in product design and user experience, while engineering staff were responsible for creating and maintaining algorithms and AI models.

The lawsuit further alleges that the proposed letter overstated Wang’s leadership and team responsibilities and contained broader claims about the national importance of his work.

Tillinghast said he did not have the factual, professional or governmental basis to support those assertions. He worked with Wang to revise the letter to include statements he said he could truthfully endorse and removed or declined to endorse the broader national-interest portions, according to the complaint.

Tillinghast also consulted a member of Meta’s internal immigration legal team before refusing to sign the broader version of the letter, the lawsuit says. He alleges his refusal was based on his belief that he should not submit materially inaccurate statements to US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) or attach his professional credentials to unsupported claims in an immigration proceeding.

Why the green card petition mattered

The immigration filing involved an EB-2 National Interest Waiver, a route through which eligible foreign nationals can seek US permanent residence without the usual requirement for a specific job offer and labour certification.

The complaint itself notes that an NIW assessment considers whether the proposed work has substantial merit and national importance, whether the applicant is well positioned to advance it, and whether it would benefit the US to waive the usual job-offer and labour-certification requirements.

That made the claims contained in the managerial letter relevant to the immigration petition.

Complaint says another Meta manager signed substitute letter

Tillinghast alleges he raised his concerns during a recurring meeting attended by his direct manager, Bolan Wang, and other Meta managers.

According to the complaint, Tillinghast told them he had been asked to sign an NIW letter but was uncomfortable endorsing its national-interest sections and factual claims he considered inaccurate.

Bolan Wang responded with words to the effect of: “Don’t worry about this, we’ll take care of it,” according to the lawsuit.

After Tillinghast declined to sign the broader letter, the national-interest section was routed to Bolan Wang, who then supplied or signed a substitute letter, the complaint alleges.

Tillinghast claims the substitute letter included or relied on representations he had refused to endorse, including those concerning the employee’s revenue impact, algorithmic work and leadership responsibilities.

Meta fired manager months later, lawsuit says

Meta revoked Tillinghast’s access to its internal systems on or around August 29, 2024, without prior notice and formally terminated his employment effective September 30, according to the complaint.

The lawsuit says the termination letter did not state that he was fired for underperformance and that the termination documents did not identify a performance-improvement plan, written warning, documented performance problem or individual performance rationale.

Meta later gave an oral underperformance explanation, according to the complaint. Tillinghast alleges that explanation was a pretext and that his termination was retaliation for refusing to sign the letter and raising his concerns.

Before these events, Tillinghast had worked at Meta for about four-and-a-half years and was a Manager, Product Design, Monetization GEN-AI Group, according to the filing. His responsibilities included supervising product-design work involving monetisation and generative AI initiatives.

Lawsuit also alleges selective immigration support

The complaint separately alleges that Meta selectively used its company-coordinated immigration-support process for certain Chinese-national employees while similarly situated employees of other national origins did not receive comparable support.

According to the filing, Meta's immigration-support system involved internal immigration personnel, managers, legal staff and outside counsel and could include petition preparation, legal assistance and managerial reference letters.

Tillinghast says his objection was not directed at Chinese nationals, ancestry, immigration status or lawful employment. Instead, the complaint says he objected to allegedly inaccurate statements being submitted to a federal agency and what he believed was the use of national origin, ancestry, race or ethnic identity in deciding who received an employment-related immigration benefit.

These claims are allegations by the plaintiffs and have not been adjudicated.

More than $1 million in claimed economic losses

Tillinghast says he suffered $565,574.76 in compensation-related losses and about $490,940.32 in forfeited equity, subject to evidence and adjustment based on Meta’s records.

The lawsuit brings claims including retaliation under federal law and the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination, wrongful discharge and fraudulent inducement. Tillinghast is seeking economic and other damages, while his wife has brought a derivative loss-of-consortium claim.

The plaintiffs have demanded a jury trial.