Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (DN.Y.) shared on Friday a letter saying it is from an Amazon employee and appears to refute the company’s previous denials that some of its delivery employees are urinating in bottles during the Work.
The congresswoman posted the letter in response to a tweet from Amazon’s official Twitter account, which said that if the rumors of employees urinating in bottles were true, “no one would work for us”.
“Is that you?” Ocasio-Cortez wrote the letter above, which he says is from Amazon Logistics on-road area manager Jen Snyder. The image of the letter posted by Ocasio-Cortez does not contain a date.
Provisional Archives / Getty Images
Ocasio-Cortez also tweeted a link to a recent report from The interception, who said he had obtained documents that allegedly showed that Amazon was aware that some employees were urinating in bottles.
The letter began by saying that an Amazon associate “discovered human feces in an Amazon bag that was returned to the station by a driver” and said it was the third incident reported in the previous two months. The letter discouraged officials from leaving feces in bags returned to the police station.
“We understand that DAs can have emergencies during travel and, especially during Covid, DAs have a hard time finding toilets during deliveries,” the letter said. His next sentence was in bold and underlined: “Regardless, prosecutors cannot, MUST NOT, return their bags to the station with feces inside.”
The letter then addressed problems reported about “urine bottles”.
“We noticed a recent increase in all types of unhealthy waste being left in bags: used masks, gloves, urine bottles,” the letter said. The letter discouraged drivers from leaving this “unhealthy garbage” behind.
“I know it may seem obvious, or something you shouldn’t be training, but be explicit in communicating the message that they CANNOT poop or leave urine bottles in bags,” the letter said. He concluded with a request for all recipients to respond to confirm that they received the message.
Amazon refuted claims that employees urinated in bottles earlier this week in response to a tweet from Representative Mark Pocan of Wisconsin, who accused the company of doing so and also claimed that it prevented workers from joining unions.
“Paying workers $ 15 / hour doesn’t make you a ‘progressive workplace’ when you break the union and make workers urinate in water bottles,” tweeted Pocan.
“You really don’t believe in this thing of peeing in bottles, do you? If that were true, nobody would work for us,” replied the company in its Amazon News account on Twitter.
Newsweek has contacted Amazon for comment and will update this article with any response.
This story has been updated with additional background and information.