An executive with Amazon on Friday invited Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) to visit the corporation’s facilities after she denounced its treatment of workers.
Dave Clark, Amazon’s senior vice president of worldwide operations, extended the invitation while pushing back on claims about conditions at the company that Ocasio-Cortez had shared on Twitter.
“.@aoc these claims simply aren’t true,” Clark wrote. “We are proud of our jobs with excellent pay ($15 min), benefits from day 1, & lots of other benefits like our Career Choice pre-paid educational programs. Why don’t you come take a tour & see for yourself…we’d love to have you!”
Ocasio-Cortez asserted in a tweet that “Amazon workers have to urinate in bottles & work while on food stamps to meet ‘targets,’ ” citing a Newsweek report from last year.{mosads}
The progressive lawmaker on Thursday celebrated Amazon’s decision to not go forward with plans to open half of its second headquarters in New York City.
“Anything is possible: today was the day a group of dedicated, everyday New Yorkers & their neighbors defeated Amazon’s corporate greed, its worker exploitation, and the power of the richest man in the world,” she tweeted.
Amazon’s move into New York was fiercely opposed by local and national activists, who blasted the multibillion tax incentive and argued the new offices would not benefit those already living in the area and would instead contribute to housing becoming unaffordable for low-income residents.
Some lawmakers have voiced frustration over the company’s decision to not move forward with its plans to move into New York amid pushback from activists and progressives like Ocasio-Cortez.
Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D), who represents an area where Amazon planned to set up shop in New York, said the city missed out on too many jobs and an opportunity to become a major tech hub.
“It used to be that we would protest wars, now we’re protesting jobs. People are complaining about jobs coming. If this had gone through, it would have made overnight New York City the high-tech capital of the East Coast,” she said Friday night on CNN.
Amazon announced in November that it would split its second headquarters between Long Island City in New York and Crystal City in Arlington, Va., just outside Washington.