Intro 518, the Delivery Protection Act, would license last-mile facilities and require the operator to employ the people who deliver the packages. Mayor Zohran Mamdani endorsed it. Amazon's Kelly Nantel said the bill threatens more than 5,000 jobs across more than 40 Delivery Service Partners. Amazon's Q2 2026 operating income was $27.5 billion.
Today the last-mile wreck in New York usually lands on a Delivery Service Partner. The van is painted like Amazon. The quota is Amazon's. The name on the caption is a local contractor. Council Member Tiffany L. Cabán introduced the Delivery Protection Act, Intro 518 / Int 0518-2026, to put the parent on that paper. If the bill becomes law, the company that runs the last-mile facility employs the driver. Respondeat superior then has a named defendant with a tower.
What moved this week is the mayor, on camera. On August 10, 2026, Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced support for Cabán's bill. The New York City Mayor's Office put out a release that day. The same day, a social video carried by NY1 and Business Insider put his line on the record: "If Amazon is delivering your packages, then they should follow the rules of every other delivery company." In a statement QNS and amNY both printed, Mamdani said corporations like Amazon "build billion-dollar business models by insulating themselves from accountability through a system of exploitative subcontracting." He called the Delivery Protection Act "commonsense regulation." QNS reported he would sign it if it reaches his desk.
Thursday, August 13, the press-conference week went to City Hall. QNS reported hundreds of union members at the rally, Teamsters among them, with Council Members Shekar Krishnan and Selvena Brooks-Powers and Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso on the steps. Cabán, on NY1, named the caption problem: "People that are in Amazon vests, driving Amazon vans, delivering Amazon packages. They're saddled with impossible quotas, vehicles that are falling apart. And then, when something inevitably goes wrong because of that. Amazon gets to say, not my employee, not my problem because they use the sham of a subcontracting model to insulate themselves." In a statement the Mayor's Office and amNY both carried, she said companies like Amazon have "operated in our city like it's the Wild West, ignoring workers' rights, putting our communities in danger, and acting with impunity."
The bill's mechanism is employment, not a new tort. It would require last-mile operators to directly employ the core delivery workers who do the work, and to license last-mile facilities through the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection. That is a City Council lever. It is not a verdict. It is the predicate that decides whether the next crash complaint names a local DSP or the company that reported $27.5 billion in operating income in the second quarter of 2026.
NY1 put the cosponsor count at 34 this week. Earlier, Jacobin had said more than 30. Speaker Julie Menin has not taken a side and has not backed this version, NY1 and Jacobin both reported. The file is still under consideration. Nobody has reclassified a single driver.
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Amazon's answer is already on the record. Kelly Nantel, an Amazon Communications Executive, said the legislation as written would put "the jobs of more than 5,000 of their employees at risk" and force the company to consider relocating delivery operations outside the city. Amazon says it works with more than 40 Delivery Service Partners in New York. Gizmodo put Amazon's Q2 2026 operating income at $27.5 billion.
The city and Amazon have already clashed on the same delivery network. amNY reported that in May 2026 the city recovered more than $9 million in unpaid idling fines tied to Amazon's delivery fleet. That is a prior-clash number, not a crash verdict.
The live issue is the caption. Under the present model, the DSP is the employer on paper. The parent sets the pace and stays one contract away from the wreck. Vicarious liability, if it attaches at all, has to be built through agency or control, a theory a judge can cut. If Cabán's bill passes and the parent must employ the driver, that add-on fight shrinks. The named employer is in the case on day one. The first notice of loss names a different insured. The primary policy is a different form. The excess tower, if there is one, is no longer a DSP policy written for a local contractor.
If Amazon is delivering your packages, then they should follow the rules of every other delivery company.
None of that is a New York last-mile verdict. Do not invent one. If the driver is an Amazon employee, Amazon is the defendant when the last-mile wreck happens. If the driver stays a DSP employee, the paper stays where it is. Intro 518 is the vote that chooses between those two captions.
Menin's silence keeps the bill from being a done deal. A mayor's video does not enact a local law. A City Hall rally does not mark it up. The Speaker has not backed this version.
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