The Amazon Labor Union (ALU) is moving forward with unionization efforts at Amazon’s JFK8 warehouse after having “reached a sufficient showing of interest” to hold an election, according to National Labor Relations Board spokesperson Kayla Blado. The NLRB says that it’s scheduled a hearing for February 16th, after which the specifics and date for the election will be decided. This is only the second time Amazon’s warehouse workers have made it to this point in the unionization process, as Vice reporter Lauren Kaori Gurley pointed out on Twitter.
On Wednesday, the ALU tweeted that its petition had been accepted and that “the fight is just beginning.” It’s been working to unionize Amazon workers in New York for a while: in October 2021, it filed with the NLRB to hold a union election for Amazon facilities on Staten Island. It later withdrew the request because it didn’t have enough signatures, and refiled in December, focusing on just the JFK8 warehouse where it held walkouts before.
There’s currently another union drive at its BHM1 facility in Bessemer, Alabama, where an election is scheduled to begin on February 4th. It’s the second election at that warehouse, and was ordered after the NLRB ruled that Amazon had interfered with the first, which was held in 2021.
Amazon provided the following statement from spokesperson Kelly Nantel:
We’re skeptical that there are a sufficient number of legitimate signatures and we’re seeking to understand how these signatures were verified. Our employees have always had a choice of whether or not to join a union, and as we saw just a few months ago, the vast majority of our team in Staten Island did not support the ALU.
Update January 26th, 9:08 PM ET: Added statement from Amazon.