Workers demand Google expand abortion protections

Extending medical travel benefits to contractors sought.

Google staffers are calling on the tech giant to take greater steps to protect work- ers’ reproductive health, including by expanding travel benefits for medical services to contractors and halting political donations to antiabortion groups.

In a petition circulated by the Alphabet Workers Union

and shared with The Wash- ington Post, more than 650 workers demand that the company create a task force to implement a slew of policy and product changes aimed at addressing abor- tion-related risks.

The move marks the first major organizing campaign at Google in response to the Supreme Court ruling revoking the right to abor- tion, which sparked back- lash among workers in Silicon Valley.

“For us this is a fundamental crisis that needs to be dealt with immediately and swiftly and not just put on

the back burner,” said Ale- jandra Beatty, a lead orga- nizer on the petition.

After the June decision, Google reiterated in a memo to staff that their benefits package allows employees to travel out of state for medical procedures that are unavail- able to them, including abor- tions, and that they can apply for permanent relocation “without justification.”

But union leaders say that crucially leaves out contractors and temporary work- ers who are not afforded the same benefits — many of whom live in states cracking down on abortions.

“I have fellow co-workers, a couple thousand in Texas,

that have not been granted travel reimbursement, and they’re actually the people who need it,” said Beatty,

who leads the union’s South- west chapter.

Google declined to com- ment. Organizers said com- pany leaders had yet to respond to the petition.

Google is the latest tech company to face mounting calls to action from its work- force amid an intensifying nationwide crackdown on abortions.

More than 1,600 Amazon employees signed an earlier petition demanding that the company denounce the overturning of Roe, stop donating to politicians who oppose abor- tion, sponsor abortion rights protests and expand travel benefits for workers. The com- pany didn’t return a request for comment at the time. (Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post.)

Workers at the gaming giant Activision Blizzard, which Microsoft announced plans to buy, protested in July to demand the company offer greater protections related to abortions.

They called for workers living in “locations passing discriminatory legislation,” such as antiabortion laws, to be offered relocation assistance.

The new petition demands that Google protect users “from having their data used against them and addressing the disinformation and misleading information,” including by removing fake results for abortion clinic and boosting health-related privacy controls.

Google said injuly it would begin deleting the location history for users “soon” after they visit abortionclinicsand other sensitive locations. Democrats have called on companies to limit their collection of sensitive information amid fears states will use the data to prosecute abortions.

B e at t y called the announcem e nt a “good start.” But the petition calls for more sweeping action, stating that “abortion access information on Google must never be saved, handed over to law enforcement, or treated as a crime.”