Ex-Apple employee claims company fired him and knew about his past comments on women, people of color

• Antonio García Martínez said Friday that Apple fired him, and knew about his previous writing.
• Bloomberg had reported García Martínez left Apple after employees criticized that writing.
• The employees called his comments “misogynistic” and demanded Apple investigate, The Verge reported.
• See more stories on Insider’s business page.

Former Apple employee Antonio García Martínez has disputed the company’s account of his departure, claiming on Twitter on Friday the company fired him and that it was aware of the content of his autobiography, which came under fire from employees this week.

“Apple was well aware of my writing before hiring me. My references were questioned extensively about my bestselling book and my real professional persona (rather than literary one),” García Martínez tweeted.

Apple employees earlier this week internally and publicly criticized the company’s decision to hire García Martínez, circulating a petition, first reported by The Verge, calling past comments from his autobiography “misogynistic” and saying his hiring didn’t align with Apple’s stated values around diversity and inclusion.

Hours after The Verge’s story, Bloomberg reported that García Martínez had left Apple.

Apple would not confirm the details of his departure, but spokesperson Tom Neumayr told Insider: “At Apple, we have always strived to create an inclusive, welcoming workplace where everyone is respected and accepted. Behavior that demeans or discriminates against people for who they are has no place here.”

Now, García Martínez is taking issue with Apple’s account of his arrival at, and departure from, the company.

“Apple actively recruited me for my role on the ads team, reaching out via a former colleague to convince me to join,” García Martínez tweeted.

“I did not ‘part ways’ with Apple. I was fired by Apple in a snap decision,” he said, adding “Apple has issued a statement that clearly implies there was some negative behavior by me during my time at Apple. That is defamatory and categorically false.”

Apple employees had criticized García Martínez’s 2016 book, “Chaos Monkey,” according to The Verge, where he wrote statements such as: “Most women in the Bay Area are soft and weak, cosseted and naive despite their claims of worldliness, and generally full of s–t.”