A group of 26 Meta employees has sued the company.

They claim it used artificial intelligence systems to select people for layoffs.

The system disproportionately targeted workers on medical, parental or family leave, they say.

The lawsuit was filed in federal court in Oakland, California.

It says Meta used internal AI tools, keystroke monitoring, and algorithm-assisted performance rankings to decide who would be laid off.

The plaintiffs argue that employees on protected leave could not earn the same scores as active workers.

Meta did not account for leave when using these scores, the lawsuit claims.

Many of the 26 employees took pregnancy or parental leave.

Others took medical leave for disabilities.

One employee said a manager warned him that taking approved leave would lead to layoff selection.

About half the plaintiffs took leave for caregiving or pregnancy-related reasons.

Meta said the claims lack merit and that people, not AI, made the decisions.

The lawsuit alleges violations of several federal laws, including the Family and Medical Leave Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act.

It also cites "disparate impact," a legal concept that the Trump administration has moved to abandon.

The plaintiffs' lawyers said they seek to keep the workers employed pending arbitration.

They argue that the layoffs would cause irreversible harm.