Teamsters union members go on strike at an Amazon factory in Alpharetta, Georgia, the United States, on December 19, 2024. An Amazon delivery truck passes by people marching with signs.
Elijah Nouvelage | Elijah Nouvelage Reuters
Amazon Workers at seven plants in New York, Georgia, California and Illinois went on strike Thursday to lobby for better benefits, higher wages and safer working conditions.
The strike, organized by Teamsters union members, is aimed at forcing Amazon to the negotiating table and avoiding disruption during the peak of the holiday shopping season. The union has previously given Amazon until sunday Agree on a negotiation date for the contract.
“If your package is delayed during the holidays, you can blame Amazon’s insatiable greed,” Teamsters President Sean O’Brien said in a statement. “We gave Amazon a clear deadline to demand Amazon sat down to do the right thing for our members and they ignored it.”
An Amazon spokesperson said in a statement to CNBC that the Teamsters Association has been engaged in a year-long campaign to “intentionally mislead the public.” Amazon said that while the union claimed to represent thousands of employees and drivers, the protesters at the scene were “almost all outsiders.”
“The fact that they were unable to get adequate support from our employees and partners and brought in outsiders to harass and intimidate our team is inappropriate and dangerous,” the company said, adding that it “will Continue to focus on getting customers” their holiday orders. “
Representatives of the Teamsters union did not immediately respond to CNBC’s inquiry about whether outsiders were involved in the strike.
The Teamsters union claimed that nearly 10,000 Amazon workers had joined the organization as of December 31, 2023, accounting for less than 1% of the company’s 1.53 million employees. Amazon’s biggest strike yet.
Amazon has long opposed workers unionizing, but efforts to unionize began to materialize in 2022, when warehouse workers in Staten Island, New York, voted to unionize. Amazon had actively fought union efforts, so this was a bitter defeat for the company.
In June, workers at Amazon, the leader of the Staten Island movement, voted to support the Teamsters union after they encountered difficulties negotiating a contract with Amazon.
—CNBC’s Annie Palmer contributed to this report
watch: How two friends formed Amazon’s first U.S. union and what’s next
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