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Posted on 09/15/2026 5:22:46 PM PDT by Morgana
A Pregnancy Discrimination Lawsuit Against Amazon
Four women have filed a class action lawsuit against Amazon, accusing the corporation of refusing them accommodations while they were pregnant. The women are suing under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA), which forbids businesses that employ 15 or more workers from denying reasonable accommodations to pregnant employees.
The women are being represented by the nonprofit A Better Balance and the law firm Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward & Maazel. A Better Balance was the chief organization advocating for the passage of the PWFA.
The group drew attention to the widespread problem of pregnant workers, particularly low-wage ones, being pushed out of employment after requesting accommodations such as being able to sit during work, having time off to attend prenatal appointments, and being exempted from tasks involving physical activities that could put them or their babies at risk.
Details of the Lawsuit
According to the lawsuit:
All four [women] asked Amazon for basic pregnancy-related accommodations so they could keep doing their jobs. Amazon denied them basic modifications the law recognizes pregnant workers regularly need, even in uncomplicated pregnancies: Bathroom breaks. An extra 15-minute break. Sitting instead of standing…
Amazon applied its unlawful policy of demanding medical paperwork for every pregnancy-related accommodation request, no matter how basic. This is no small ask: In early pregnancy, it can take weeks to schedule a doctor’s visit or obtain a medical note…
Then, when Plaintiffs took medically-necessary breaks or absences to get off their feet, visit the doctor, or go to the emergency room, they were punished. Amazon deducted their limited bank of unpaid time off. Soon enough, they had depleted that limited bank of “unpaid time off,” and Amazon threatened to terminate them.
Amazon went on to fire all four plaintiffs.
Pregnant Employees’ Experiences “Not Unique”
According to the lawsuit, the four women’s experiences at Amazon were “not unique.” The lawsuit claims that in 2025 alone, A Better Balance received dozens of calls from other pregnant Amazon employees saying they were being denied accommodations such as breaks, chairs, and time off for doctor’s appointments.
Inimai Chettiar, president of A Better Balance, said, “Denying a pregnant worker a stool, a lighter workload, or a bathroom break is a violation of federal law — it’s that simple.”
According to Debbie Greenberger, a partner at ECBAWM who is representing the workers:
The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act became law years ago. Amazon should have well-established policies to comply with federal law. Under its policies, pregnant workers are not protected, and they face retaliation for exercising their rights. Too often, pregnant women working at Amazon warehouses have to risk their health or their pregnancy just to do their jobs.
The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act
The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act was passed with overwhelming bipartisan support and took effect in 2023. During the pro-abortion Biden administration, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, then under Democratic control, passed regulations requiring the PWFA to apply to abortion, birth control, and in vitro fertilization as well.
This led to lawsuits from pro-life states seeking to block these changes. In 2025, a federal judge ruled against the abortion provision, striking it down. So, the PWFA no longer requires employers to accommodate abortion requests.
However, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, now running for Senate, filed a lawsuit to strike down the PWFA entirely on the grounds that some members of Congress voted for its passage remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Trump administration is continuing this lawsuit. This may be an attempt to set a precedent for striking down other laws passed during the pandemic.
Unfortunately, if the Trump/Texas lawsuit against the PWFA is successful, it will be much harder for pregnant workers to hold corporations accountable for refusing them accommodations, discriminating against them, or firing them.
Not the First Lawsuit for Amazon
This isn’t the first time Amazon has been accused of failing to comply with federal labor laws regarding accommodations. In November 2025, A Better Balance filed a separate class action suit alleging that Amazon unlawfully penalized disabled warehouse workers who requested accommodations.
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I’d have to see their job descriptions to know whether working while sitting was a reasonable accommodation. If the job was walking around a warehouse picking products or loading vans, it probably wasn’t. Lots of other jobs, maybe it would be.
So far, this is as far as I’ve gotten....
“The women are suing under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA), which forbids businesses that employ 15 or more workers from denying reasonable accommodations to pregnant employees.”
Are women who work for a company with less than 15 employees less pregnant than those who do not? I guess their feet and back do not hurt, they don’t have to go to the restroom more frequently, and never have to go to the doctor.
[Now I’ll go read the remainder of the article.]
If a woman takes a job that involves heavy lifting, then gets pregnant, how is an employer supposed to accommodate that? They’d have to give her a new job that doesn’t include lifting. But maybe there aren’t any.
Several years ago, my younger daughter was a pharmacy tech at Walgreen. When she got pregnant, her doctor insisted she sit the majority of her work day, due to spotting. They had no choice but to accommodate her, but they sure didn’t want to. Which was silly, because her job was mostly to prepare compounded meds, which doesn’t require standing.
I've heard at least five incidences where Amazon fired people for taking too many or too long bathroom breaks.
Inversely, I understand they accommodate Muslim Prayer breaks but haven't seen that for myself. I DO know Dell did that for imported savag, er, Somalis when they had a factory in Lebanon Tennessee. It totally screwed up the "just in time" production setup so badly that Dell closed the whole place down - only to repeat the same mistake in another state.
With the profits Amazon pulls one would think they'd utilize robotics wherever possible and train humans to keep them supplied and moving. I saw that working beautifully at an auto parts manufacturer so know that can be done both profitably and humanely.
it is an amazon warehouse.
there are lots of jobs, and you can cross train.
none of them are rocket science, except for the forklifting probably
First of all, I’d bet a jelly donut the facts of these cases aren’t nearly as cut-and-dried as the linked article would have you believe.
Second, the overarching result of this suit is Amazon will undertake a stealth policy to hire fewer women of childbearing age.
This is way men get paid more.
They don’t need so many accommodations.🤔
Way is supposed to be why.🙄
A company the size of Amazon, and they only managed to find four incidents???
A case of a lawyer thinking they can shakedown Amazon?
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