AP: Labor movement targets Amazon as a foothold in the South

[Omaha Steve]

https://apnews.com/article/politics-amazoncom-inc-alabama-3cbaed47a649aa808b554d295a712d9d




Rep. Terri Sewell, D-Ala, in the center wearing red, and Rep. Nikema Williams, D-Ga., at the far right, join fellow members of Congress, labor organizers and employees at an Amazon facility in Bessemer, Ala., on March 5, 2021. The nearly 6,000 workers at the plant are voting on whether to form a union. The election is the largest unionizing effort ever for Amazon, one of the world’s wealthiest firms, and would be a major victory for organized labor and its Democratic Party allies as the labor movement tries to reverse decades of declining membership nationally. (AP Photo/Bill Barrow)


By BILL BARROW

BESSEMER, Ala. (AP) — The South has never been hospitable to organized labor. But that may be changing, with an important test in Alabama, where thousands of workers at an Amazon campus are deciding whether to form a union.

Labor organizers and advocates see the David-and-Goliath fight as a potential turning point in the region with a long history of undervalued labor and entrenched hostility to collective bargaining rights. A win could have economic and political ripples for the labor movement and its Democratic Party allies who want a stronger foothold in the South amid decades of dwindling union power nationally.

“This election transcends this one workplace. It even transcends this one powerful company,” said Stuart Appelbaum, national president of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union. “If workers at Amazon in Alabama, in the middle of the pandemic, can organize then that means that workers anywhere can organize.”

The mere presence of a national union figure like Appelbaum in Alabama underscores the stakes.

FULL story at link above.