No Questions Asked? The Peculiar Election Of The ALU Affiliating With The Teamsters
The once-independent Amazon Labor Union is now a Teamster local, but there are unanswered questions
By Peter List, Editor | June 19, 2024
The Amazon Labor Union is now part of the Teamsters. Is it “official” though?
Almost every media outlet is reporting that the once-independent Amazon Labor Union is now part of the Teamsters.
While the media accepts the story at face value, none question the strangeness of this particular “election.”
Here are just a few:
What members? How does a union with zero members—as the ALU reported to the Department of Labor last year—suddenly have 850 members who voted for the affiliation?
Can the Teamsters automatically represent 5,500 warehouse workers in an election conducted by the two unions (without National Labor Relations Board [NLRB] election safeguards) and where 85 percent of the affected employees did not vote at all?
“ALU-International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT) Local 1, which will be newly chartered, will represent the roughly 5,500 Amazon warehouse workers at JFK8 in Staten Island, N.Y.,” announced the Teamsters, “and will have jurisdiction for Amazon warehouse workers across New York’s five boroughs.”
Given that the 2022 election that the Amazon Labor Union won is still being contested and the fact that ALU (with zero members) and the Teamsters conducted their own election amongst the 5,500 Amazon workers (who are not members of any union) at a bus stop (see below) does it have any legal standing?
If all Amazon workers at JFK8 were eligible to vote, were proper notices given to all workers, as they would be in a NLRB-conducted election?
Even though, as one Reddit described it, the election was a “dumpster fire” and unions campaigned outside the JFK8 facility to the point police had to be called (see below), it is unlikely the NLRB will step in to conduct a proper election.
As a result, the once-independent Amazon Labor Union will now be part of the Teamsters…no questions asked.