Twitter is currently facing financial problems, and to address those, the company is preparing to implement cost-cutting efforts.
With this, the company's owner and CEO Elon Musk decided to reshape Twitter's legal team in anticipation of the possible legal battle that the company may face in the future.
As part of reshaping the legal team of the company, Musk recently dismissed Alex Spiro, one of his close personal allies. Spiro is a criminal defense lawyer who successfully defended the CEO in his "pedo guy" defamation case in 2019.
Elon Musk Dismisses Alex Spiro
According to Engadget, the billionaire had charged Spiro to lead Twitter's legal and policy teams.
However, the CEO reportedly became displeased with him after discovering that the personal lawyer had kept James Baker in the company as Twitter's deputy general counsel.
After finding out that Baker has been responsible for reviewing Twitter's decision to restrict tweets related to a 2020 article The New York Post published about Hunter Biden's laptop, the billionaire fired the former FBI attorney.
According to reports, Musk brought over "more than half a dozen" lawyers from SpaceX to do the work of Spiro and Baker.
The legal team advising Twitter now includes SpaceX's Senior Vice President and General Counsel, Tim Hughes.
In anticipation of potential litigation, the billionaire has also reportedly told employees not to pay travel invoices. Similarly, the same order was made when it comes to other vendors the company owes money to for their services.
Meanwhile, according to The New York Times, Musk and other executives have also talked about the possible consequences of not giving severance payments to the thousands of employees who were laid off in the past weeks.
According to Engadget, when the billionaire first took ownership of Twitter, he reportedly considered not giving severance pay to employees who were laid off.
However, in compliance with state and federal labor laws, he eventually decided to give at least two months of pay and one month of severance to laid-off employees.
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Twitter Takes Drastic Steps to Cut Costs
During one of the meetings at Twitter after Musk took over the company in October, he told the employees that the social media platform's financial position was dire.
The billionaire also issued a warning that bankruptcy was "not out of question." Since then, it seems the situation at the company has worsened.
With this, the company decided to take drastic steps to cut costs, according to The New York Times.
According to reports, the company has not paid rent for its main headquarters in San Francisco in recent weeks. Likewise, it has also failed to pay rent to satellite offices in other countries.
The court documents obtained by the said news outlet also indicate that the company has refused to pay a $197,725 bill for the charter flights the billionaire took during his first week at Twitter.
Moreover, despite Twitter CEO's statement that the company was done with layoffs, the company has continued to cut its workforce.
One of the most recent casualties is Nelson Abramson, the company's global head of infrastructure. Twitter disbanded its Trust and Safety Council of external advisors on Monday.
Related Article: Twitter Could File For Bankruptcy, Elon Musk Tells Staff
