She was demoted without warning while her boss was giving her high remarks. The company reversed the demotion after she brought in a lawyer.
That's retaliation.
This is a separate issue now though. Just because something isn't completely proven (yet, anyway) doesn't mean that it doesn't already look bad from the outset.
And if you listen to what they're actually saying, they're alleging retaliation, not merely disagreeing with the direction the company is going on.
If anything it sounded like they disagreed with the company's business direction. Leaders listened, made some changes.
They still disagreed...this time with leadership not feeling a change was necessary.
they then quit as they disagreed with the company's direction.