A delivery driver for Lowe’s says his manager called him back to work and sent a white driver in his place after a customer requested that no black deliverymen go to her home.
“I asked him why I couldn’t do it, and he said, ‘Because you’re black and they don’t want you at the house,’” Marcus Bradley, who’s worked for the company for 11 years, told ABC affiliate WSET.
Bradley’s co-worker, Alex Brooks, who is white, said he refused to complete the delivery without Bradley. “It just ain’t right for a business that we work at to go on with the woman’s wishes,” Brooks said.
Chris Ahearn, a spokesperson for Lowe’s, told the Washington Post that the company fired the manager who called Bradley back and “completely” backs its drivers. “We have zero tolerance for discrimination of any kind, and we should never have accepted the terms of the sale with the individuals who were delivered to.”
A separate statement from the company said “diversity and inclusion [are] core values” and that “the request should have been refused.”
A WSET reporter contacted the customer involved the incident, who asked not to be identified and said she did not regret her request. “I got a right to have whatever I want, and that’s it,” she said.
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