BESSEMER, Alabama (AP) – Some Democratic members of Congress and national union leaders on Friday sought support for uniting a massive Amazon facility outside Birmingham, comparing the organization of the Alabama workers’ campaign to the civil rights movement.
Postal voting by approximately 6,000 workers in the sprawling distribution facility began in February and will run through the end of March. It is the largest organization effort in Amazon history, with high stakes for the country’s second largest employer, which has a record of crushing union effort in its warehouses and its Whole Foods supermarkets.
The result is critical to Amazon and to organized labor in general.
If the Alabama effort succeeds, it could trigger a chain reaction in Amazon’s entire nationwide operations, with thousands of additional workers demanding better working conditions and seeking collective bargaining. It would also be seen as a boon to other labor sectors in the historically anti-union South and beyond.
U.S. Representative Terri Sewell, whose Alabama congressional district includes the Bessemer facility, welcomed four fellow House Democratic Caucus members to call attention to the vote. Sewell noted that the delegation’s visit comes days before Selma, her hometown, commemorates Bloody Sunday and the 1965 Voting Rights March.
“These workers follow a rich tradition … of crusading against something wrong,” Sewell said, echoing some workers’ claims that Amazon’s working conditions and pay are inadequate.
“The world sees Alabama winning someday,” she said. “Birmingham, Bessemer, it is so important for the world to know that Alabama is standing up again for civil and human rights.”
Representatives Nikema Williams from Georgia, Cori Bush from Missouri, Andy Levin from Michigan and Jamal Bowman from New York traveled to Alabama to meet with Amazon employees and officials from the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union who want to organize the workers.
The group gathered at the union headquarters and also went to a crossroads outside the Amazon complex.
The visit comes ahead of the expected House vote next week on the PRO Act, a union-backed proposal designed to strengthen workers’ ability to organize in collective bargaining unions. Lawmakers said they expect the measure to pass the Democratic-controlled House, but acknowledged that it will face a tough fight in the 50-50 Senate, where Republican opposition is likely enough to prevent the act from gaining the 60 votes. necessary to pass most major legislation.
At the Alabama facility, a majority of 6,000 workers would have to vote “yes” to organize the facility. Amazon unsuccessfully tried to postpone the vote and demand a personal vote.
The company, which saw profits and revenues soar during the pandemic, has campaigned hard to convince workers that a union is only costing them money. Company officials say employees already get what they look for in a union: benefits, career growth, and a salary that starts at $ 15 an hour.
Others dispute that.
Levin, the Michigan congressman who was once a union organizer, called it “the most important working-class election in this country in my life.”