Amazon fires workers who criticized warehouse conditions during coronavirus pandemic

Amazon fired two employees after they criticized the working conditions at the company’s warehouses, media outlets reported.

Emily Cunningham and Maren Costa, who worked as user experience designers, were fired on Friday, according to The Washington Post.

Cunningham posted on Twitter that she would match donations up to $500 to warehouse workers. “The lack of safe and sanitary working conditions puts them and the public at risk,” she wrote.

Costa retweeted Cunningham’s post and also wrote that she would match donations from warehouse workers “while they struggle to get consistent, sufficient protections and procedures from our employer.”

Amazon said they were fired for “repeatedly violating internal policies,” according to Reuters.

Amazon told Reuters it supported “every employee’s right to criticize their employer’s working conditions, but that does not come with blanket immunity against any and all internal policies.”

The company also said Tuesday that Bashir Mohamed, a warehouse worker in Minnesota, was fired due to “progressive disciplinary action for inappropriate language, behavior, and violating social distancing guidelines,” according to CNBC.

BuzzFeed News reported Mohamed spoke out about the company’s treatment of workers and advocated for better working conditions to stop the spread of coronavirus.

Earlier in April, Amazon fired Christian Smalls, a worker who led a protest at a fulfillment center in Staten Island against the warehouse’s working conditions, calling for it to be temporarily closed amid the pandemic, The New York Times reported.

This story was originally published April 14, 2020 at 1:31 PM with the headline "Amazon fires workers who criticized warehouse conditions during coronavirus pandemic."