Tesla published a blog post Monday in response to a report that the company has been undercounting injuries sustained by workers at its Fremont, Calif. factory.
The report comes from Reveal, a news website produced by the Center for Investigative Reporting. Reporters spent months searching Occupational Safety and Health Administration injury and illness records, as well as workers’ compensation, fire and 911 call records. The outlet says dozens of current and former factory workers were interviewed.
According to the report:
“Undercounting injuries is one symptom of a more fundamental problem at Tesla: The company has put its manufacturing of electric cars above safety concerns, according to five former members of its environment, health and safety team who left the company last year. That, they said, has put workers unnecessarily in harm’s way.”
Injury rates at the factory have been higher than the industry average in recent years, but improved significantly in 2017. The company published a blog post in February touting a plan to be the safest car factory in the world. Reveal’s report suggests that Tesla frequently mislabeled injuries occurring at work as “personal medical,” which helped it meet industry standards. It also says Tesla avoided using the color yellow as a way to mark hazards because CEO Elon Musk does not like the color.
Tesla fired back Monday with a strong denial of the report. According to the statement:
“We welcome constructive criticism, but those who care about journalistic integrity should strive for the truth above all. Unfortunately, the writers at Reveal have published an article that paints a completely false picture of Tesla and what it is actually like to work here. In our view, what they portray as investigative journalism is in fact an ideologically motivated attack by an extremist organization working directly with union supporters to create a calculated disinformation campaign against Tesla.”
Tesla said Reveal’s report “reflects a lack of understanding about how injury reporting works” and called the report of an aversion to yellow “truly ridiculous.” You can read the full blog post here.