(Amazon Photo)

Harried, sleep-deprived, and again on his way back to Bessemer, Ala. for what could be the most momentous week of his professional life, labor boss Stuart Applebaum compared the difficult process of unionizing thousands of Amazon warehouse workers in the deep south to the 1960s civil rights movement.

“This has breathed new life into the labor movement,” said Applebaum, president of the Retail Wholesale and Department Store Union, when reached in New York on his cell phone over the weekend. “People all over the globe are inspired. This is about civil rights.”

More than 5,800 Amazon workers in Alabama are currently voting by mail on whether to organize under the RWDSU, an 80-year-old organization led by Applebaum since 1998. Voting ends on Tuesday and counting begins to decide if Bessemer will be the first unionized workforce in Amazon’s 26-year history (more on the upcoming process below).

At stake isn’t just union representation for several thousand Alabama-based employees of the online retail giant, but also the company’s ongoing relationship with hundreds of thousands of its lowest-paid workers across the country.

And in some ways, the vote has also become a proxy for the health of the national labor movement as a whole.

“If you pull this off here, believe me: workers all over this country are going to be saying, ‘if these people in Alabama could take on the wealthiest guy in the world, we can do it as well,'” Sen. Bernie Sanders said at a rally near Bessemer on Friday.

Sen. Bernie Sanders speaks at a rally in Birmingham, Ala. on Friday. (Screenshot via BernieSanders.com livestream)

Labor organizers see Bessemer as either the kindling to heat up a modern unionization movement in Amazon and elsewhere or, if it fails, as the type of frigid, enthusiasm-dampening shower common in the company’s hometown of Seattle.

So far, Amazon has been winning in its effort to prevent any unionization foothold. But Applebaum said it won’t be like that forever. In fact, he added, it might not be like that anymore in just a handful of days.

Win or lose, the union is going to keep pressing Amazon, he said.

“We already see this as a win,” he said, noting President Biden’s endorsement of union rights earlier this month and the calls he now gets from other fulfillment centers across the country. “This (fight) will determine the nature of work itself. Lose or win we are still not going away.”

RWDSU President Stuart Appelbaum. (RWDSU Photo)

Amazon executives have taken a significantly dimmer view of Applebaum’s effort to unionize the company’s workers at the fulfillment center called BMH1. The company leaders have indicated that they’d like to see the union enthusiasm grind to a halt forever in the 26,000-person town.

To that end, Amazon leaders, such as Worldwide Consumer CEO Dave Clark, took to social media last week to criticize the push for union representation and politicians who are sympathetic to the effort, such as Sen. Sanders and Sen. Elizabeth Warren.

Clark’s tweets — and subsequent comments from Amazon’s PR account — were reportedly sparked by Bezos himself, with Vox detailing how Bezos wanted the company to defend itself more strongly against criticism.

Labor organizers have countered with an array of accounts of Amazon’s alleged union-busting tactics that include intimidation of union-sympathetic workers in places previous to Bessemer.

At Bessemer, workers have complained of Amazon flooding employees with anti-union rhetoric on posters in bathrooms, hallways, and in mandatory staff meetings. Organizers even claimed that Amazon appealed to the city to get traffic signals changed to make union organizing harder. Amazon denied the allegations.

“We work hard to support our teams and more than 90 percent of associates at our Bessemer site say they would recommend Amazon as a good place to work to their friends,” Amazon’s Drew Herdener, Vice President of Worldwide Communications, said in a statement. “We don’t believe the RWDSU represents the majority of our employees’ views.”

Certification votes must be in by Tuesday, but effectively the mail-in ballots should have been sent well before then. Overseen by the National Labor Relations Board, the vote will be authenticated and then counted in the coming days.

Unless the ballot is a landslide either way, the issue isn’t likely to be settled this week as both sides are expected to mount legal challenges to individual ballots.

Union organizers have focused on Amazon’s aggressive work rate and minimal breaks, the fact that thousands of its warehouse staff still qualify for food stamps, and the 100% annual employee turnover in many of the company’s fulfillment centers.

Publicly, Amazon executives have defended company policies by noting that its $15-an-hour wage, health benefits, retirement benefits, and upward mobility opportunities set it apart from many warehouse jobs. The company notes that it exceeds the state minimum wage in most places where its warehouses are located and that it consistently works to improve conditions for its employees.

Noted Herdener: “Our employees choose to work at Amazon because we offer some of the best jobs available everywhere we hire, and we encourage anyone to compare our total compensation package, health benefits, and workplace environment to any other company with similar jobs.”

UPDATE 10 p.m. Amazon’s Herdener offered this additional comment: “Our employees know the truth—starting wages of $15 or more, health care from day one, and a safe and inclusive workplace. We encouraged all of our employees to vote and hope they did so.”

A New York Times report earlier this month noted that the median wage for greater Birmingham, where Bessemer is located, was almost $3 above Amazon’s base pay at BMH1.

 

Embed from Getty Images

Here’s a rundown of what to expect for the union voting process:

  • Mail-in ballots must arrive at the National Labor Relations Board office in Birmingham by Tuesday morning, March 30. The NLRB office is 21 miles from BMH1.
  • At 10 a.m. on March 30, ballot inspection begins. This is the stage in which Amazon or the RWDSU can challenge a ballot’s legitimacy. Representatives from both sides can observe the ballot sorting but this session is closed to the general public and media.
  • Ballots can be challenged under two broad categories: eligibility of the person and eligibility of the ballot. For example, a ballot can be tossed out if it was cast by an employee who actually is ineligible to vote, such as certain managers or someone who left the company after voting. It also can be discarded if it isn’t clearly marked.
  • Challenged ballots will be set aside for a hearing and decision by the NLRB’s Region 10 director. “We expect a lot of them,” said RWDSU spokesperson Chelsea Conner.
  • The remaining eligible ballots will then move to a public counting process at the NLRB’s Birmingham office. This likely would happen a day or few days after the initial sorting process. Voting observers can attend this count by Zoom. This is the vote to determine if a majority of employees have elected a union.
  • EXCEPT: If the number of challenged ballots could mathematically flip the election, then the counting process holds until the Region 10 director renders a decision on the undetermined ballots.
  • The election could then be called after the challenged ballots are ruled upon and counted.
  • HOWEVER, both sides have opportunities for challenges and appeals to the process that could eventually reach federal court and leave the election undetermined for a while.

Editor’s note: This story was updated with comment from Amazon.

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