The United States labor authorities filed a complaint accusing the e-commerce giant Amazon of threatening and surveilling workers trying to organize a union in a New York warehouse.
Amazon allegedly grilled workers about union activities at the Staten Island warehouse and promised to address complaints in exchange for voting against their representatives, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) argued in a complaint filed Thursday.
At stake is whether workers could be the first to unionize at an Amazon warehouse in the United States.
The NLRB alleges that the company “repeatedly violated the law by threatening, surveilling, and questioning workers at its Staten Island warehouses who are engaged in a union organizing campaign.”
The board has asked a judge, with a hearing scheduled for April 5, to order Amazon to educate workers and managers about employee rights when it comes to unionizing.
Amazon rejected the allegations, saying “they are false and we look forward to proving that through this process.”
Literature on union issues was allegedly removed from a break room and “confiscated” from some employees, according to the filing.
A campaign to form what could also be the first union at an Amazon warehouse in the United States will continue next month with a new vote in Bessemer, Alabama.
Last year a vote in Bessemer ended in defeat for organizers, who accused Amazon of breaking the rules and were granted a new election on appeal.
The vote in the small town of Bessemer garnered media attention as it pitted employee supporters — artists, Democratic and Republican lawmakers, and even President Joe Biden — against Amazon.
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