Laid-off Twitter workers have been forced to drop their class-action lawsuit demanding more severance pay

A US District Judge ruled in Twitter's favor, saying ex-workers couldn't continue with a class-action suit. The five laid-off workers had signed arbitration agreements agreeing

not to bring suits against Twitter. The judge told the workers who filed the suit to file individual claims for arbitration instead. Five laid-off Twitter workers have been

forced to drop their class-action lawsuit against the company and have been ordered by a judge to file individual claims for arbitration instead. US District Judge James

Donato ruled in Twitter's favor in an order on Friday, saying that the former workers had signed arbitration agreements as part of their employment contracts with Twitter, which

said they would bring legal disputes against the company in arbitration rather than in court and included a class-action waiver. "Twitter provided signed copies of the

agreements, and they are all clear and straightforward," Donato wrote in the order. Since Elon Musk took ownership of the company in late October, Twitter has laid off

thousands of workers. Musk has said that these former employees would get three months of severance pay and the lawsuit says that Twitter repeatedly told its staff prior to the

acquisition that even under the billionaire's control they would still get separation packages at least as good as those previously promised by the company, which included two

months of severance pay.