President Joe Biden on Wednesday expressed support for efforts to unionize Amazon workers, after one of the company’s warehouses voted to join a union last week.
“The choice to join a union belongs to workers alone,” Biden said in remarks at the national conference of North America’s Building Trades Unions. “By the way, Amazon, here we come. Watch.”
On Friday, workers at an Amazon warehouse on New York’s Staten Island voted overwhelmingly to join the Amazon Labor Union, a grassroots organization made up of current and former company employees. The election outcome was a watershed moment for labor organizers, who’ve sought to unionize Amazon warehouse and delivery workers for years.
Amazon has long opposed unions among its workforce and ran an aggressive campaign to discourage workers from unionizing at the Staten Island warehouse, just as it did at an Alabama warehouse last spring, where workers rejected unionization. A do-over election at the Alabama warehouse concluded Friday, but the results hang on a number of challenged ballots.
In March 2021, Biden endorsed union drives happening in Alabama and across the country, but he stopped short of naming Amazon specifically. He also discouraged employers from interfering in elections.
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