General President Sean O’Brien and Mayor Zohran Mamdani rallied with Amazon workers, Teamsters, and community supporters on the steps of New York City Hall to demand a vote on the Delivery Protection Act.
The Delivery Protection Act would require delivery companies to directly employ their drivers and be directly responsible for street safety.
“Amazon has built a system that lets bosses avoid that responsibility. Drivers are standing up and demanding change. I’m proud to stand with them, the Teamsters and Councilmember Cabán in the fight for the dignity and protections every worker deserves,” Mayor Mamdani said at the rally.
The Delivery Protection Act would be a game-changer at companies like Amazon and UPS Roadie which use a scam subcontracting model to exploit drivers, drive down standards, and avoid liability for public safety.
Authored by Councilmember Tiffany Cabán, the Delivery Protection Act is supported by a supermajority of the City Council as well as Mayor Mamdani. But City Council Speaker Julie Menin has prevented it from coming up for a vote.
“New York City has the opportunity to make history, to do what’s right by the folks that deliver for New York City every single day,” General President O’Brien said. “Speaker Menin... call for the vote. We demand a vote.”
“We’re already working towards what it’s going to take to implement the bill and to enforce the bill. We’re there, we just need it to be brought to a vote as soon as possible. That’s what the workers deserve,” said Councilmember Cabán.
The fight for the Delivery Protection Act is really a showdown over the future of work in the age of AI.
Amazon wants a future where technology fuels a race to the bottom, with packages delivered by drones and drivers who work for subcontractors or deliver out of their personal cars while being supervised by an app.
It’s a sweatshop future without unions or basic worker, consumer, and public protections the labor movement has won over the last century.
UPS and DHL want to join Amazon in this race to the bottom. We don’t.
Teamsters are fighting back by supporting the Delivery Protection Act, organizing at Amazon, DHL and UPS, and gearing up for the UPS contract campaign.
“The Teamsters are honored to lead the fight to fix a broken system stacked against working people,” said Teamsters General President Sean O’Brien. “We thank Mayor Mamdani, Councilmember Cabán, and the supermajority of the City Council for standing with workers at this critical moment.”
“These Amazon employees are not gig workers. They are not 1099 workers. This is a multi-trillion-dollar corporation that needs to follow the rules,” said Teamsters Local 804 President Vincent Perrone.
