Andrew Dudum is the CEO and founder of the telehealth company known as Hims & Hers Health, Inc., commonly referred to as Hims.

The entire company is based upon providing convenient telehealth care, mostly for men. As their website states:

Hims is a 100% online platform with over 1 million subscribers that connects patients to licensed healthcare professionals in all 50 states. We offer support for sexual health, skincare, mental health, and hair care.

Through our simple online process you can connect with licensed medical providers who can recommend customized treatment plans including prescription treatments, if appropriate, shipped right to your door.

So, OBVIOUSLY, a telehealth company is going to have VERY STRONG OPINIONS about Israel and Gaza, right??? Well, Andrew Dudum does. Last Wednesday, Dudum made the announcement that he would be “eager” to hire all these protesters on college campuses who were setting up encampments, taking over buildings, and yelling at and assaulting fellow students while chanting anti-Semitic slogans.

Moral courage > College degree

If you’re currently protesting against the genocide of the Palestinian people & for your university’s divestment from Israel, keep going. It’s working.

There are plenty of companies & CEOs eager to hire you, regardless of university discipline.…

— andrewdudum (@AndrewDudum) May 1, 2024

The full post on Twitter/X reads:

Moral courage > College degree

If you’re currently protesting against the genocide of the Palestinian people & for your university’s divestment from Israel, keep going. It’s working.

There are plenty of companies & CEOs eager to hire you, regardless of university discipline.

Apply here:

Dudum then provided a link to the Hims application information page. Perhaps he should have checked with Google regarding how well it works when you hire people who think that their activism should dictate the goals of the company.

As you can imagine, making such a loud and definitive statement had an impact on his company as his tweet went viral. And it wasn’t pretty.

Buzzy healthcare company Hims & Hers lost nearly $210 million in stock value in a single day after the company’s CEO said he and other executives were “eager” to hire anti-Israel student protesters who’ve faced disciplinary actions from their universities.

The online sexual health and pharmaceutical company plummet 8% on Friday from its opening price of $12.24 to $11.26 — just two days after Palestinian-American CEO Andrew Dudum said companies would be happy to have the protesters and encouraged them to apply to Hims and Hers.

The market cap of the company opened at $2.62 billion and closed at $2.41 billion, and share price continued to slide in after-hours trading on Friday and Saturday.

Trading volume was also more than double the average for the stock — indicating that some shareholders were rushing to get out.

Dudum, who founded Hims and Hers in 2017 and has family in Gaza and the West Bank, took on a markedly different tone from other CEOs who have derided or promised not hire student protesters.

As some YouTube finance channels pointed out, Dudum has been calling for a ceasefire since last November. But this tweet was different, as his “ceasefire” tweet didn’t directly involve his company. In this case, he was openly encouraging student protesters to apply to Hims.

And since Hims is a publicly traded company, it has a board of directors, with Dudum at the head of it. Anyone want to guess how thrilled they are at the moment?

Well, it seems that Andrew Dudum is in the process of trying to do some pretty big damage control. He put out a tweet thread that is supposed to “explain” his thinking on Sunday evening.

The last few days have been a disheartening reflection of just how divisive a time we live in. I’d like to clarify a few things because my words have been misconstrued by some.

— andrewdudum (@AndrewDudum) May 5, 2024

The entire tweet thread reads:

The last few days have been a disheartening reflection of just how divisive a time we live in. I’d like to clarify a few things because my words have been misconstrued by some.

I, in no way condone nor support acts or threats of violence, antisemitism, or intimidation and there is absolutely no justification for violence on our campuses. Every student deserves to feel safe without fear of harm or being targeted for who they are. I am deeply saddened that my support for peaceful protest has been interpreted by some as encouraging violence, intimidation, or bigotry of any kind.

I do believe deeply in the right for people to use their voices in peaceful protest to drive change. This right is critical to our democracy and must be protected. Our world today is more just because students throughout history have courageously taken to their campuses and used their voices to force change. Generations of Americans have engaged in non-violent protest, and these movements have led to some of the most important changes in our country’s history.

As a father whose children are both the descendants of Palestinian refugees who fled the Nakba in 1948, and the descendants of Holocaust survivors from Poland, as I have previously shared, I have a personal appreciation for the different perspectives people have which I live with daily at my dinner table.

I hope and pray for peace and for an end to violence everywhere.

Dudum then linked to a Medium post that he wrote last November, calling for a ceasefire just over a month after October 7th. That post contains some of the same information that he posted in the tweet thread, begging fellow CEOs to grasp the “nuance” of the situation.

Our values are based on the respect for human dignity and life. The belief that all lives are equally valued and need to be protected and prioritized. That all children should be safe and housed. That all peoples should have access to clean water, food, medical care and basic necessities under all circumstances. That everyone, in all parts of the world should have equal rights regardless of their color or creed in the land that they call home. And that freedom of movement and education be accessible to all.

It is upon those values that I believe all leaders and CEOs should use their platform today to call for an immediate cease fire. To actively recognize Israel’s right to defense and also recognize the means and manner in which they are responding violates international law. I ask us to find nuance, and share our voice today to help save innocent lives.

It is within nuance where truth exists. For Palestinians and Israelis to find a lasting peace, a vision for the future that is based on shared values will be required. As an industry that dreams up, invests-in and builds the future, I believe our community of founders, investors and executives can help paint this future as well. To do so, requires us to move past the ease of a simple narrative, to grapple with the delicacy of nuance. We must fight publicly against false binaries to ultimately find and spread the truth.

Dudum is using his personal intersectionality as a shield – oh, my children are both Palestinian and Jewish, so I have the moral authority to speak out! But in both his Medium post and his tweet thread, he tips his hand. Even as he says Israel has a right to defend itself, and as he complains that they are defending themselves after October 7th, he refers to the “Nakba.” He does this in the tweet thread, and he says it in the Medium post. For those who are unaware, “Nakba” is the Arabic word for “catastrophe,” and it is the term used by Palestinians and their supporters regarding the creation of the state of Israel in 1948. Last May, Rashida Tlaib, with the help of Bernie Sanders, threw a “Nakba Day” event in a Senate hearing room (after then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy refused to allow her the use of any of the House hearing rooms). The term, when referring to Israel, is an intentionally loaded one. So, even as Andrew Dudum claims that he has to be sensitive to both sides, he is clearly biased toward one of them.

And then let’s consider what he did say. He applauded the protesters, called for divestment from Israel, and claimed that what is happening in Gaza is a “genocide.” Wow, such nuance, right??? Now, he wants everyone to know that he is NOT “encouraging violence, intimidation, or bigotry of any kind.” Except that that is exactly what the protesters are doing. Jewish students are being threatened, intimidated, attacked, and targeted. And Dudum just told all those protesters doing that to apply for a job at his company. If what he said was all about “peaceful protest,” then why is he having to do damage control now? I don’t think his words were THAT “misconstrued.”

Perhaps he would like to still have a job this week?

Your CFO called, didn't he

Told you that something bad was about to happen?

Yeah, it is. Monday is gonna hurt https://t.co/fd8pORUKyY

— MrMikeD (@Mrmiked42) May 6, 2024

"Geeze, my company stock crashed and my financial partners are really mad I'm okay with college campus calls for dead Jews. So, who wants a Bud Light?" https://t.co/ikPZTHp8YW pic.twitter.com/WinF4buQj9

— Stephen L. Miller (@redsteeze) May 6, 2024

It will be interesting to see how the Hims board of directors decides to proceed after watching the stock go into freefall. Can Dudum remain the CEO after losing $210 million in stock value? And what is the stock going to look like when trading really gets going today, even after Dudum’s attempt to “clarify a few things”? Andrew Dudum is in the “find out” stage of FAFO. The rest of us get to watch and see just how painful it will become.

Featured image via geralt on Pixabay, cropped, Pixabay license