A high-profile human rights organization has fired a whistleblower who went public with her concerns about its handling of sexual harassment allegations — even though the group installed a new board chair and created new ethics and workplace safety policies after she spoke up.
Two months after NOTUS published an investigation into sexual harassment within human rights groups, one of the women who went on the record, Julie Millsap, said she was terminated from her role as a contractor for the nonprofit Uyghur Human Rights Project. As government relations manager for the group, Millsap advocated for policies to protect Uyghurs and others from oppression by the Chinese government.
UHRP placed Millsap on paid leave shortly after she raised alarms in the May 10 NOTUS report about the group’s response to misconduct claims. She had voiced the same concerns internally for months but felt the nonprofit was not taking her seriously. She was initially set to be on leave for one week, according to a May 11 email informing Millsap of the decision, but UHRP extended it without a clear return date. On July 7, the new board chair told her the panel had chosen to end her employment.
The board has been “extremely troubled by your contacting UHRP stakeholders, partners, donors, journalists, and government officials to air your grievances and allegations, taping private conversations of staff meetings and publishing them, as well as your posting of damaging social media posts and videos,” UHRP board chair Justinian Ben-Adam wrote to her, according to a copy of an email obtained by NOTUS.
“All of this has been very detrimental to our organization, has shattered board member and staff trust for you, and has made your continuing at UHRP not possible,” he continued.
In a statement to NOTUS, Millsap said that she wished “tools and a willingness on the part of management to address issues had been what I encountered, so that I didn’t feel that speaking to journalists and outside parties was the only option for resolution.”
Millsap said she was told the board made the decision unanimously and offered her severance.
UHRP did not respond to a request for comment, nor did it reply to questions from NOTUS about Millsap’s job status in late May or June.
After her termination, Millsap criticized UHRP’s move to let her go because it had not yet completed a new independent investigation of how her concerns were handled.
“I was left largely in the dark for 2 months after the article broke, with no indication that any positive steps would be taken. Statements are important, but are only a very small starting step to addressing some deep-seated issues in the organization,” she said.
“Nonetheless, I see signs of hope that the board will exercise greater oversight in the future, and I hope that no one else will have to suffer as I did in trying to do what is right,” she added. “Most importantly, I hope that we can continue to push for a cultural shift that prevents such incidents from occurring.”
In interviews with NOTUS, Millsap claimed UHRP was not prepared to address misconduct claims against its then-board chair, Nury Turkel.
Turkel, a prominent Uyghur activist and former chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, stepped down as leader of UHRP’s board the week after NOTUS published the investigation. His attorney did not respond to a request for comment that month on his resignation, nor a request this week for a statement.
When asked in May about allegations against him by three women who’d said he’d made them uncomfortable, Turkel’s attorney declined to comment because he said he was considering legal action but said Millsap — who pressed UHRP to investigate the claims after hearing about them from others — was unreliable and had “harassed” Turkel and his family.
In a statement after the NOTUS article was published, UHRP said, “We can do better.” Its leadership pledged to undertake a new independent misconduct probe and to explore ways to strengthen its ethics policies.
“We will be taking a number of additional concrete steps going forward to address gender-based violence and harassment in the workplace, to ensure that UHRP promotes a safe working environment for everyone,” the group said.
In June, UHRP announced it had formed an internal committee to investigate misconduct claims and another committee to identify shortcomings in its ethics policies and procedures. In July, it published a detailed ethics and harassment policy.
The initial article revealed widespread allegations of sexual harassment and misconduct within the human rights world.
Nineteen women involved in human rights advocacy told NOTUS that activists can often get away with misconduct without consequence. Victims don’t want to hurt the causes they believe in by making public claims against high-profile human rights defenders. They also fear being labeled Chinese spies. When accusers do raise concerns, they learn many human rights groups don’t have the resources or training to handle allegations professionally.
Millsap said she hopes her experience doesn’t discourage others from speaking up.
“I need to do my best to make sure that I don’t end up as a cautionary tale to other women,” she told NOTUS.
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Haley Byrd Wilt is a reporter at NOTUS.