FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 1, 2022
Contact: Ryan Rudominer, ryan@redhorsestrategies.com
Erica Smiley: “This triumphant union victory over Amazon represents a watershed moment in the Labor Movement”
Washington, DC – Dubbing it a “watershed moment in the labor movement,” on Friday, Jobs With Justice congratulated Amazon workers in Staten Island for a resounding victory in forming the first union at an Amazon facility in the U.S. and defeating Amazon’s anti-labor, union-busting tactics. In Bessemer, Alabama, the Amazon unionization vote remains “too close to call” in the do-over election ordered after the NLRB found that Amazon improperly interfered in last year’s tally.
Erica Smiley, Executive Director of Jobs With Justice stated the following:
“We congratulate Amazon workers at the JFK8 facility in Staten Island on their historic, David vs Goliath victory over Amazon to form the first Amazon union in the United States. Amazon finally got what it deserved today after the trillion-dollar company ignored the demands for safer working conditions in 2020 from its workers exposed to COVID and retaliated against Christian Smalls and others who led a walkout. The closeness of the election in Bessemer, Alabama is a further indication of the genuine sea-change for all Amazon workers and workers everywhere.
“Despite Amazon spending millions running every dirty trick in their union-busting playbook to prevent employees from organizing and bargaining collectively, these courageous workers proved they could not and would not be silenced.
“Workers, have won. Amazon has lost. The company should end all of its challenges in Bessemer and elsewhere and commit to negotiating in good faith with the unions workers have formed.
“Radicalized by their framing as ‘essential’ during the global COVID-19 pandemic and angered by the murder of George Floyd in the summer of 2020, many Amazon workers—particularly Black workers—took their piece of the Black Lives Matter movement and organized on the shop floor.”
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