On Wednesday, pro-Donald Trump group America First Legal issued a class action suit against Amazon, accusing the company of privileging its Black, Native American and Latino employees over their white and Asian counterparts.
America First Legal (AFL) filed a five-page complaint in the Eastern District of Texas on behalf of a white Texas woman, claiming that the corporation engaged in racist business practices by paying Black, Latino and Native American “delivery service partners” a $10,000 bonus and not offering the same benefit to its white or Asian delivery partners.
AFL president Stephen Miller said that Amazon founder Jeff Bezos was treating people differently “based solely on the skin color.”
“Amazon planned, orchestrated, and implemented its explicit system of racial preferences and exclusions that tears at the very fabric of our civilization, for ours is a nation built on the precipice of equal rights, equal justice and full equality under the law,” said Miller. “But Amazon has decided it is exempt from these legal and moral mandates: they are grievously mistaken. AFL will do all it can to ensure Amazon is judged harshly by our courts.”
Amazon has several programs targeted to help Black business owners. The company launched its Diversity Grant program to help minority entrepreneurs and its Black Business Accelerator program to give a boost to Black-owned businesses that sell on Amazon.
AFL took the issue to Twitter, posting a three-part thread that outlined the class-action lawsuit.
🧵/1 Amazon is offering a $10,000 bonus to its delivery service partners- but only for those partners who are Black, Latino, or Native American.
This is a flagrant violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1866. pic.twitter.com/8WnRuMn8S4
— America First Legal (@America1stLegal) July 20, 2022
AFL denounced the e-commerce giant’s business practices as a “flagrant violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1866” and said that the legal group was “committed to stamping out illegal discrimination.”
The legal group is headed by several senior members of the Trump administration, including the former chief of staff, budget director, acting attorney general and senior advisor.
The nonprofit describes its mission to be to build a team of “some of the nation’s best legal, political, and strategic thinkers” to oppose “the radical left” and “defend our citizens from constitutional executive overreach.”
Featured Image via CNBC
