Reform Caucus Wins Amazon Labor Union Officer Elections
Members of the reform slate and other JFK8 workers confronted management last month about heat sickness in the warehouse. Photo: ALU Democratic Reform Caucus
Amazon workers at the JFK8 fulfillment center on Staten Island, New York, voted to elect reform officers in the first-ever leadership election.
“We are extremely excited to announce that every candidate on our reform caucus slate won decisively in our union’s leadership elections,” said Connor Spence, co-founder of the Amazon Labor Union and former treasurer, who won the presidency. “After more than two years of fighting to reform our union to make it more democratic, transparent, and militant, we are relieved to finally be able to turn our full attention toward bringing Amazon to the table and winning an incredible contract.
“The movement to organize Amazon is still growing rapidly, and for us, our Teamster allies, and rank-and-file members, much of this is uncharted territory. We’ll be communicating in the coming days our transition plan and how we expect to execute the tremendous task ahead of us. For now we’re grateful to our members, supporters, and movement allies for standing with us and making this win possible.”
Official tallies have not yet been released, but people who observed the vote count said the reform caucus won about 50 percent of the votes for each seat, and the ALU-Ma'at slate got about a quarter. Total turnout was tiny, roughly 250 out of 5,500 workers.
Workers said the low turnout is partly explained by their co-workers' unfamiliarity with a mail-ballot election. Postal delays meant some workers didn’t receive their ballots in time. The instructions were also confusing, requiring multiple steps. Another snafu was a change in vendor at the last minute.
David-Desyrée Sherwood, a slate member who won a seat, said the union had failed over the past two years to properly engage members. “So there’s a large number of people still disengaged,” they said. “Our caucus did as much as we could to campaign and get the word out.” The caucus sent mass texts, emails, and campaigned outside the facility and at the bus stop. Caucus members walked the warehouse wearing their organizer vests, handing out pamphlets. The reform caucus won all 15 top leadership spots, including the four spots on the executive board and 11 on the union's constitutional committee.
Both slates emphasized in their campaigns winning a new contract. But the reform caucus also vowed to make sweeping changes to transform the union: creating a system of stewards, allowing members to vote on and approve budgets, hiring an external firm to conduct financial audits quarterly, and expanding the executive board from the current four officers to 20 to 30 JFK8 workers drawn from the shop floor.
The vote came after the Teamsters announced an affiliation agreement on social media in June, and workers voted to affiliate the independent Amazon Labor Union with the Teamsters, creating a new New York City local, ALU-IBT. An overwhelming majority voted in favor of affiliation, with 829 yes votes and only 14 nos; turnout in that vote was 16 percent.
Yes voters hoped the affiliation with Teamsters would bolster the ALU’s bargaining power. The union is still fighting for a first contract to improve working conditions at the mammoth warehouse and secure higher wages and better benefits.
The ALU won a landmark election to organize 8,000 warehouse workers in New York more than two years ago. Amazon continues to challenge the union’s victory with legal appeals.
Current and former ALU executives ran on the ALU-Ma'at slate, promising truth, justice, and harmony—qualities of the Egyptian goddess Ma'at. Claudia Ashterman, Tyrone Mitchell, Rina Cummings, and Arlene Kingston ran for president, vice president, recording secretary, and secretary-treasurer, respectively. The slate was backed by some of the union’s founders: Chris Smalls, Derrick Palmer, Gerald Bryson, and Jordan Flowers.
Ashterman declined to comment via text message.
A third slate known as Workers First! led by Michelle Valentin Nieves, a former ALU executive board member and a key leader in the union, also ran, but it garnered only a small portion of the vote.
The ALU Democratic Reform Caucus slate included Spence for president, Brima Sylla for vice president, Kathleen Cole for secretary-treasurer, and Sultana Hossain for recording secretary.
The JFK8 fulfillment center is the only unionized Amazon facility in the United States. Now their fight for a contract will be backstopped by support from the Teamsters.
Luis Feliz Leon is a staff writer and organizer with Labor Notes.luis@labornotes.org