Amazon denied a breathless, pregnant warehouse worker the one thing she begged for: a chair.

That manager's answer now sits at the center of a new lawsuit against one of America's largest employers.

Four pregnant women say Amazon fired them for the very medical needs the law says it must accommodate.

A Chair She Was Never Allowed To Use: Inside Amazon's Pregnancy Discrimination Lawsuit

Jennifer Hatch worked the returns line at an Amazon warehouse in Lancaster, New York.

She found out she was pregnant in January 2025.

Her pregnancy was high-risk, and her doctor said she needed a 30-pound lifting limit, a 15-minute sitting break every four hours, and shifts capped at eight hours.

Amazon denied all of it.

In early March, Hatch says she was struggling to breathe on the line while an empty chair sat within reach.

Her manager wouldn't let her use it.

Not long after, following unpaid time off she took for pregnancy-related hospital visits, Amazon fired her.

Wheeled Out In A Wheelchair, Fired Five Days Later Under The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act

Willamina Barclay worked at Amazon's Rochester, New York warehouse.

After lifting heavy packages, she was hit with severe abdominal pain.

Amazon removed her from the building in a wheelchair and rushed her to the hospital for what the lawsuit calls a pregnancy-related emergency.

One day later, Amazon sent her a termination warning.

Five days after that, she was fired.

The lawsuit says Amazon counted her hospitalization against her limited bank of unpaid time off, and docked her pay because she had "worked partially that day."

Hatch and Barclay are two of four named plaintiffs in a class action filed September 8 in Brooklyn federal court under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, the 2023 law requiring employers with 15 or more workers to accommodate pregnant employees.

The women are represented by A Better Balance, the nonprofit that led the fight to pass the law in the first place, along with the law firm Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward & Maazel.

Amazon Says It Approves 99.9 Percent Of Requests. These Four Women Weren't In That Number

A Better Balance says these four women are not outliers.

In 2025 alone, the group fielded dozens of calls from other pregnant Amazon workers with the same complaint: an employer that wouldn't bend for a doctor's note.

This isn't Amazon's first accommodation lawsuit this year either.

A Better Balance filed a separate class action against Amazon in November 2025 on behalf of disabled warehouse workers who say they faced the same punishment for asking for help.

Amazon calls the lawsuit inaccurate and claims a 99.9 percent approval rate – a number four fired mothers say doesn't match what actually happened to them.

"Denying a pregnant worker a stool, a lighter workload, or a bathroom break is a violation of federal law – it's that simple," said A Better Balance president Inimai Chettiar.

Debbie Greenberger, the ECBAWM partner representing the four women, put it more bluntly: "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 Pro-Life States Already Fought For

Here's the part pro-life families should actually be watching.

The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act exists so a woman doesn't have to choose between her paycheck and her pregnancy.

That's not a partisan idea – it passed Congress with overwhelming bipartisan support back in 2022.

Pro-life states already won one real fight over this law.

When the Biden EEOC tried to twist the PWFA into a mandate forcing employers to accommodate abortion and IVF requests, a federal judge struck that provision down in 2025.

That's a genuine pro-life win, and it's the law working the way it was supposed to – protecting women who choose to carry their pregnancies, not covering for the abortion industry's preferences.

Pregnant women shouldn't need a wheelchair ride to the hospital before an employer takes their pregnancy seriously.

The chair Jennifer Hatch was denied should have been the easiest request Amazon ever said yes to.

Sources:

• Sarah Terzo, "Amazon Refused Accommodations, Fired Pregnant Workers," LifeNews.com, September 14, 2026.
• Claire Savage (AP), "Lawsuit: Former Amazon workers claim pregnant women, struggling for breath, weren't even allowed to sit down," Fortune, September 10, 2026.
• Regyl Jaen, "Pregnant Amazon Worker Was Fired Five Days After Being Wheeled Out of Warehouse and Hospitalised, Lawsuit," IBTimes UK, September 9, 2026.
• U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, "Pregnant Workers Fairness Act," eeoc.gov.
• Jonathan Stempel (Reuters), "Amazon Accused in Lawsuit of Systematic Discrimination Against Pregnant Employees," Insurance Journal, September 9, 2026.