Big money titans rally to back Bill Ackman against $2M shakedown demand by ex-staffer

Billionaire hedge fund boss Bill Ackman says he’s the victim of a “shakedown” attempt by a former employee demanding a $2 million severance payment after alleging an “unsafe workplace” — prompting wealthy captains of industry to publicly back the moneyman.Ackman recently laid out his case in a lengthy X post that quickly went viral, writing, “I am reaching out to the @X community for advice,” and vowing to “fight this nonsense to the end of the earth.”He said last Saturday that he launched his family office, called Table, about 15 years ago, putting it in the hands of a friend he described as “someone that I trusted implicitly.” The office later “grew massively” as headcount and costs ballooned despite having a largely administrative role, he added.Ackman said he remained mostly hands-off — conducting only an annual review — with the goal of having the firm “handle everything other than my day job so that I would have more time for my job and my family.”As costs and turnover “ballooned,” he brought in his Harvard-educated nephew — who did a “superb job” turning around another investment, according to Ackman — to review operations, leading to layoffs of about a third of staff.Most employees exited “professionally,” Ackman said — except for an in-house lawyer he called “Ronda” who rejected three months’ severance and demanded two years’ pay after working just two-and-a-half years.Ackman said she refused to speak with him before the firm received a “threatening letter” alleging “harassment and gender discrimination” and an “unsafe work environment” — claims he called “interesting” given she oversaw compliance.The letter alleged his nephew made “inappropriate and genderbased [sic]” remarks about a female employee’s age, appearance and family planning, and warned she would “seek all appropriate relief” in court if a deal isn’t reached.Ackman said the issue had been raised internal...