Saying Amazon warehouses have an abysmal safety record, US Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, announced an investigation into working conditions at the company’s facilities. Sanders chairs the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, which is handling the investigation. Sanders wrote a letter to Amazon CEO Andy Jassy raising a number of concerns and seeking data as part of the investigation. Amazon strongly disagrees with the letter.

“The company’s quest for profits at all costs has led to unsafe physical environments, intense pressure to work at unsustainable rates and inadequate medical attention for tens of thousands of Amazon workers every year,” Sanders wrote in the letter. “The time has come for Amazon to stop willfully violating workplace safety laws with impunity and commit to changing its operations to protect the health and safety of its workers.”

Given that Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, worth nearly $150 billion, ranks as one of the world’s richest men and Amazon is worth $1.3 trillion, the company "should be one of the safest places in America to work, not one of the most dangerous,” Sanders wrote.

Amazon warehouse employees suffered more serious injuries than all other warehouse workers in the US combined, according to Sanders.

In a statement to SIA, Amazon said it has reviewed the letter and strongly disagreed with it.

“We take the safety and health of our employees very seriously,” Amazon said in the statement. “There will always be ways to improve, but we’re proud of the progress we’ve made which includes a 23% reduction in recordable injuries across our US operations since 2019. We’ve invested more than $1 billion into safety initiatives, projects and programs in the last four years, and we’ll continue investing and inventing in this area because nothing is more important than our employees’ safety.”

Amazon said Sanders has a standing invitation to tour one of its facilites. The company also notes that Sanders cites data from the Strategic Organizing Center — a coalition of three labor unions, the SEIU, CWS and UFW.

Amazon also said it released a safety, well-being and health report covering data from 2022. In addition, it released a blog regarding helping workers during summer heat.

The committee is demanding that Amazon provide information about injury and turnover rates at its warehouses, the connection between the extremely fast pace of work demanded of its workers and injury rates, and the medical care provided at its on-site medical clinics.

Among the questions asked in the letter, Amazon was asked to provide the total number of employees or contractors who have been treated under the company’s Amcare program or other on-site first aid or medical care. Amcare is a program of on-site clinics at Amazon warehouses.

This announcement comes as earlier this week new safeguards went into place for warehouse workers in New York.