Amazon must comply with US agency’s pregnancy bias probe, judge rules

:A New York federal deem has ordered Amazon.com to personal a examine a subpoena from a U.S. civil rights agency investigating claims that the safe retailer discriminated against pregnant warehouse workers.

U.S. District Train Lorna Schofield in New york slack Thursday rejected Amazon’s claims that the Equal Employment Quite a lot of Price (EEOC) subpoena became once too great and sought inappropriate knowledge.

The EEOC is seeking knowledge on requests that pregnant workers at 5 U.S. warehouses made for accommodations a lot like limits on heavy lifting and extra breaks, and whether Amazon granted or denied them.

Amazon spokesperson Sam Stephenson acknowledged the firm has cooperated with the investigation because it started three years ago and disagreed with the EEOC’s characterization of its conduct. Amazon is ok with the advantages and fracture day it presents to workers who are pregnant or whose companions personal given start, he acknowledged.

“We rob this pickle very significantly and stop awake for showing why the EEOC’s issues are untrue,” Stephenson acknowledged in a observation.

The commission’s probe became once precipitated by complaints from 5 ladies who exclaim they confronted pregnancy discrimination whereas working at Amazon warehouses in New Jersey, Connecticut, North Carolina, and California.

Amazon acknowledged it has equipped the EEOC with about 370,000 pages of knowledge in step with the subpoena, but not in the particular format requested by the agency.

Schofield in her ruling acknowledged the ideas sought in the subpoenas became once obligatory for the EEOC to resolve whether Amazon engaged in illegal discrimination. The deem gave Amazon except Aug. 9 to personal a examine the subpoena.

An EEOC spokesman declined to comment.

In 2022, a New York hiss agency filed an administrative complaint accusing Amazon of requiring pregnant and disabled warehouse workers to rob unpaid leaves of absence, even supposing they were in a position to working, in desire to offering accommodations. That case is pending.

Amazon has denied wrongdoing and acknowledged it strives to enhance it workers, but acknowledged in a observation responding to the New York complaint that “we do not continuously fetch it staunch.”

The EEOC issued a subpoena closing year seeking 5 lessons of knowledge, collectively with knowledge on accommodations Amazon equipped to warehouse workers with disabilities. At the time, federal law simplest required companies to present the identical accommodations to pregnant workers that they gave to workers with disabilities.

A law handed later closing year mandates that employers accommodate workers’ pregnancies regardless of how they treat workers with disabilities.