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Equality

Amazon Activist’s Firing Deemed Illegal by Labor Board Officials

  • Fledgling union seeks election at Staten Island warehouses
  • Company has been grappling with unprecedented wave of activism
A protest outside an Amazon.com facility in the Staten Island borough of New York in May 2020.

A protest outside an Amazon.com facility in the Staten Island borough of New York in May 2020.

Photographer: Michael Nagle/Bloomberg
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U.S. labor board prosecutors plan to formally accuse Amazon.com Inc. of illegally firing an activist who was trying to unionize its New York warehouses, unless the company first settles the case.

The fledgling Amazon Labor Union alleged in November that Amazon illegally fired one of its organizers, Daequan Smith. The National Labor Relations Board’s Brooklyn-based regional director found merit in those allegations and “will issue a complaint if the case does not settle,” agency spokesperson Kayla Blado said Friday. The complaint would allege an illegal retaliatory firing as well as other violations of the law, she said in an email.