Popular online retail and streaming company Amazon continues to draw negative attention from the U.S. government.

Today, Senators Sherrod Brown, J.D. Vance and a bipartisan group of 28 other senators have called out the company for its mistreatment of delivery drivers.

In a letter sent to the company's CEO Andy Jassy, Brown and 29 other senators requested information about its Delivery Service Partner (DSP) program and its efforts to avoid legal liability for persistent mistreatment of DSP drivers.

The letter accuses Amazon of refusing to acknowledge its truck drivers as legal employees. 

It goes further in claiming that Amazon exercises near-total control over wages and working conditions of its delivery drivers and avoids legal liability through a network of delivery service partners - independent businesses that contract with the company.

"An overwhelming body of reporting suggests this system of control without responsibility exacts an awful toll on drivers. Drivers have been made to work in extreme heat without air conditioning, forced to make deliveries in the snow without proper safety equipment like snow tires or chains, and are often pressured to skip breaks. In some instances, drivers have been forced to work for nearly twelve hours without access to a restroom," the senators wrote in the letter.

Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee Chair Sanders recently launched an investigation into "the abysmal safety record in Amazon's warehouses and the company's treatment of workers who are injured in those warehouses." 

Some of the information the senators are requesting includes:

  • What Amazon management's justification is for insisting it is not obligated to bargain with union representatives of DSP employees, given the control Amazon wields over the terms and conditions of DSP employees, such as their wages, working conditions, routes, and hours of availability.
  • What the justification is for Amazon's requirement that several DSPs sign non-poaching agreements, in light of the company's claim that it does not control the working conditions of its DSP's employees, and
  • Is Amazon responsible for the provision and maintenance of DSP vehicles and other safety and health conditions at its DSPs? If so, what is Amazon's process for ensuring compliance with state and federal regulations.

Whether or not Amazon will respond to the letter remains to be seen.