DoorDash

Unlike in 2017 when DoorDash CEO promised free food to lawyers supporting immigrants and refugees, the company has been silent on immigration in Trump's second term. While delivery workers—many of them immigrants—continue doing the actual delivering, DoorDash and other delivery companies are offering no immigration help or legal support, despite earlier commitments.

NY Attorney General Letitia James announced a $16.75 million settlement with DoorDash for misleading consumers and delivery workers by using tips intended for Dashers to subsidize their guaranteed pay. Between May 2017 and September 2019, DoorDash used customer tips to offset the base pay it had already guaranteed to workers. Approximately 63,000 New York delivery workers benefited from this settlement.

DoorDash is among companies that revised or canceled their DEI policies. The company's annual report no longer outlines examples of DEI programs, though it still states a commitment to diversity and inclusion. DoorDash also sponsored the Canada Strong and Free Regional Networking Conference 2024 featuring Christopher Rufo, the far-right activist who has made it his mission to dismantle DEI initiatives.

During the 2024 election cycle, DoorDash donated $625,000 to the Republican Governors Association (RGA), which was used to support Mark Robinson and other Republican gubernatorial candidates. Robinson has repeatedly maligned LGBTQ people with crude rhetoric, calling them 'filth' and 'devil-worshiping child molesters.' On June 4, 2024, the RGA received a $250,000 contribution from DoorDash.

New York Attorney General Letitia James announced a settlement with DoorDash for routinely rejecting delivery worker applicants with criminal histories without fair assessment, in violation of state human rights and corrections laws and the NYC Fair Chance Act. In a one-year period, DoorDash rejected approximately 3,000 New York applicants based on their criminal history without considering the age of the applicant when the offense was committed, rehabilitation efforts, or time elapsed since the offense. Of 2,898 rejected applicants, 57 submitted appeals but DoorDash did not reverse any rejections.

In August 2023, DoorDash agreed to pay $1.6 million to workers after violating Seattle's sick and safe time policy for the second time in two years. DoorDash failed to establish a system for eligible workers to request and use paid time, did not provide timely compensation for using allotted time, and did not give workers monthly notice of their paid and safe time balances. This was the second violation in two years, indicating a pattern of non-compliance with basic worker protections.

In April 2023, a class action lawsuit alleged that DoorDash bilked millions of consumers through an onslaught of hidden and deceptive fees, exploiting struggling restaurants and a largely immigrant workforce. The lawsuit alleged DoorDash charged consumers a 'city' or 'regulatory response fee' designed to appear as though imposed by local governments, when in fact it was a company-assessed fee to circumvent pandemic-era caps on delivery commissions. The suit also alleged anti-competitive pricing practices and misleading service fee structures.

In 2021, DoorDash deliberately blocked the third-party app Para, which provided Dashers with tip information before accepting deliveries. DoorDash had intentionally designed its app to hide tip information from workers, and when Para attempted to provide this transparency, DoorDash cut off its access. The Electronic Frontier Foundation highlighted this as a worker rights issue, noting that the suppression of tip information left workers unable to make informed decisions about which deliveries to accept, contributing to wage uncertainty.

DoorDash contributed $52.1 million to the Yes on Proposition 22 campaign in 2020, making it the second-largest corporate funder after Uber. The ballot measure, which passed with 59% of the vote, granted app-based delivery and transportation companies an exemption from Assembly Bill 5 by classifying their drivers as independent contractors rather than employees. The total industry spending on Prop 22 reached $205 million, the most ever spent on a California ballot initiative. The campaign included in-app messaging, billboards, digital and print ads, and pro-Prop 22 delivery bags sent to restaurants.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, DoorDash provided financial assistance of up to two weeks' pay to delivery workers in the US, Australia, and Canada who were diagnosed with COVID-19 or placed under quarantine. The company shipped more than 5.8 million sets of free hand sanitizer and masks to Dashers. DoorDash also expanded Project DASH to form partnerships with over a dozen local governments and nonprofits, with Dashers delivering over 150,000 meals to vulnerable communities in the first three weeks. This included a partnership with NYC Department of Education to deliver daily meals to up to 800 medically-fragile children.

In May 2019, DoorDash suffered a data breach via a third-party service provider that exposed personal information of approximately 4.9 million consumers, Dashers, and merchants who joined the platform before April 5, 2018. Exposed data included names, email addresses, delivery addresses, order history, phone numbers, hashed passwords, and the last four digits of payment cards. Driver's license numbers of approximately 100,000 Dashers were also compromised. DoorDash did not discover or disclose the breach until September 2019, more than four months after it occurred.

DoorDash launched Project DASH in 2018, a program that empowers food banks, pantries, and social impact organizations to use DoorDash technology and Dashers to provide local food delivery to underserved communities. Since launch, the program has powered more than 5 million deliveries of an estimated 80 million meals. DoorDash has awarded more than $500,000 in Project DASH Impact Grants to over 200 food banks and social impact organizations in more than 30 states, helping address food access gaps including in rural areas like West Virginia where families previously had to travel up to 60 miles for healthy groceries.