By Special Investigation Team | DunePost | May 5, 2025
“ALERT: When you hear the phrase ‘better working conditions,’ immediately notify your area manager. Do not engage. Redirect to approved talking points about Amazon’s competitive benefits package.” — Excerpt from leaked Amazon “Labor Activity Response Protocol,” Slide 12
For Marcus Jenkins, a warehouse associate at Amazon’s BHM1 fulfillment center in Bessemer, Alabama, the instructions on the slides became his reality. Three days after mentioning the possibility of collective bargaining during a lunch break conversation with coworkers, Jenkins called into a manager’s office.
“They said I was being written up for ‘time theft’ because I took a 22-minute break instead of 20 minutes,” Jenkins told DunePost. “But my TOT [Time Off Task] records showed I was within limits. The real issue? I had said the u-word: union.”
Two weeks and two more mysterious “productivity violations” later, Jenkins was terminated.
His story is not unique. A six-month DunePost investigation, including exclusive access to leaked internal documents, interviews with 27 current and former Amazon employees, and analysis of National Labor Relations Board filings, reveals an extensive, methodical campaign to identify and suppress worker organizing before it can gain momentum.
The leaked materials, over 230 pages of internal training documents, scripts, and strategic plans dated between January 2022 and December 2024, outline what Amazon calls its “Solidarity Response Protocol.” The never-before-seen documents provide step-by-step instructions for managers to monitor, intercept, and neutralize union organizing efforts across the company’s vast network of warehouses and delivery stations.
“These aren’t just guidelines,” said Elena Rodriguez, a former Amazon Learning Ambassador who provided some of the documents. “They’re mandatory playbooks that every supervisor and manager must follow when faced with even the slightest hint of organizing activity.”
The playbook includes:
One particularly striking document titled “Conversation Management Techniques” instructs supervisors to “isolate and redirect” employees who express collective workplace concerns.
“When Associate A mentions working conditions affecting multiple team members, immediately transition to individual problem-solving,” the document advises. “Example: ‘I hear you’re concerned about the picking rates. Let’s talk about your specific metrics and create a personal improvement plan.'”
The strategy is clear: individualize collective concerns, fragment worker solidarity.
Amazon’s commitment to remaining union-free comes with a hefty price tag. Financial records reviewed by DunePost show the company spent approximately $14.2 million on “labor relations consulting” in 2023 alone, a 32% increase from 2022.
The bulk of these expenditures went to three prominent anti-union consulting firms: Labor Solutions Partners, Workforce Unity Consultants, and Strategic Labor Advisory Group. These firms provide on-site “labor situation management,” supervisor training, and what internal documents call “psychological assessment of organizing vulnerability.”
In preparation for a potential organizing drive at its DTW3 facility near Detroit in early 2024, Amazon’s labor relations team requisitioned a special budget allocation of $842,000 for a three-month “educational campaign.” The budget included:
“The money they spend fighting us could give every associate a $3 per hour raise,” said Michael Torres, who works at the DTW3 facility. “But they’d rather pay millions to make sure we can’t collectively ask for that raise ourselves.”
The documents reveal an escalating system of what Amazon internally calls “Associate Engagement Sessions,” but what labor organizers know as “captive audience meetings.” These mandatory gatherings become increasingly frequent and pointed when an organizing activity is detected.
Diana Williams, who worked at Amazon’s fulfillment center in Staten Island before the successful union vote there, described her experience:
“First, it was just regular stand-up meetings with subtle mentions of how ‘direct relationships with management’ are better than ‘third-party representation.’ Then suddenly we were having three meetings a week where they showed slick videos about dues and strikes.”
The leaked “Engagement Session Curriculum” confirms Williams’ account, outlining a four-tier response system:
Level 1: Preventative Messaging
Level 2: Awareness Response
Level 3: Active Concern
Level 4: Critical Situation
“The pressure becomes intense,” said former process assistant James Rivera, who worked at Amazon’s LGA9 delivery station. “People start avoiding each other. The community breaks down. That’s the point — to make organizing feel impossible.”
While Amazon’s anti-union materials emphasize the company’s benefits package, particularly its $15 minimum wage introduced in 2018 and health insurance offerings, the workers we interviewed consistently pointed to fundamental workplace conditions that these benefits fail to address.
“They told us unions would just ‘take our money and make false promises,'” said Lakisha Moore, who has worked as a picker at a fulfillment center in Jacksonville for three years. “But I’ve had to pee in bottles to hit my quotas because the bathrooms are a seven-minute walk from my station. That’s the reality they don’t want us talking about collectively.”
Internal productivity documents show Amazon’s “Time Off Task” (TOT) tracking system flags workers who take more than two minutes beyond scheduled breaks. Accumulated TOT can lead to formal write-ups and eventual termination.
“They can see exactly how long you take to use the restroom,” Moore explained. “It’s tracked down to the second.”
Other common concerns cited by workers include:
“These aren’t things that better individual performance can fix,” said Carlos Gutierrez, a worker at a fulfillment center near Chicago. “These are structural issues that need structural solutions. That’s why they fear collective action so much.”
The leaked “Associate Concern Tracking System” documents reveal sophisticated methods for identifying potential organizers without explicitly targeting union activity, which would violate labor law.
The system flags employees who:
What happens to flagged employees? Analysis of termination data from five facilities with known organizing activity shows employees flagged in the system were 2.7 times more likely to be terminated for “productivity” or “behavioral” issues within six months than non-flagged employees.
“They never say it’s about the union,” said Shanice Johnson, who was fired from an Amazon Fresh warehouse in Philadelphia two weeks after distributing union literature in the parking lot. “It’s always about something technical, rate performance, time theft, safety violations. But the timing isn’t coincidental.”
NLRB records show Amazon has faced 382 unfair labor practice charges since 2020. While the company has settled many cases without admitting wrongdoing, internal documents suggest a calculated approach to managing legal risk.
One slide titled “Separation Documentation Best Practices” advises managers to “build a performance paper trail before any corrective action involving high-risk associates” and “ensure at least three documented instances of coaching before escalating to final written warning.”
Amazon’s approach represents a sophisticated evolution of anti-union tactics that date back to the early days of American industrialization. However, today’s methods reflect a technological refinement of age-old strategies.
“In the 1930s, Ford had the Service Department essentially private police who would physically intimidate organizers,” explained Dr. Heather Thompson, labor historian at the University of Michigan. “Today’s tactics are less visible but equally effective algorithms that track potential organizers, data-driven retaliation that maintains plausible deniability.”
The legal framework governing labor organizing has failed to keep pace with these developments. The National Labor Relations Act of 1935, which established workers’ right to organize, wasn’t designed for workplaces where computer systems track every movement and conversation.
“The law assumes visible, physical intimidation,” said Rebecca Williams, a labor attorney who has represented Amazon workers in NLRB cases. “It has no framework for addressing algorithmic workforce management that can effectively blacklist organizing workers without ever explicitly mentioning unions.”
This technological gap has created what labor advocates call “the new union-busting,” technically legal methods that achieve the same chilling effect as the more brutal tactics of previous eras.
When presented with findings from this investigation, Amazon spokesperson Melissa Jenkins provided the following statement:
“These claims mischaracterize our approach to employee relations. Amazon respects our employees’ right to join or not join a union, but we don’t believe unions are in the best interest of our customers, shareholders, or employees. Our focus on direct communication with our team allows us to quickly address concerns and implement improvements without the constraints of third-party representation.”
When asked specifically about the leaked documents, Jenkins stated: “We cannot verify the authenticity of these alleged materials. Amazon’s training emphasizes legal compliance and respect for employee rights while explaining the facts about union representation.”
However, when provided with specific document identification numbers and metadata, Amazon declined further comment.
Despite Amazon’s sophisticated union prevention system, workers at the JFK8 fulfillment center in Staten Island made history in April 2022 by voting to form the Amazon Labor Union (ALU), the company’s first unionized warehouse in the United States.
The leaked documents include a detailed post-mortem analysis titled “JFK8 Situation Review,” which identifies what the company considers “critical containment failures” that allowed organizing to succeed.
“The organic, worker-led nature of the campaign circumvented traditional identification protocols,” the document states. “Future early detection systems must better account for non-traditional organizing patterns that don’t involve established unions.”
The document recommends enhancing social media monitoring, increasing management presence in break areas, and implementing more sophisticated sentiment analysis tools.
Despite these planned countermeasures, worker organizing continues. The documents show Amazon is currently tracking potential organizing activity at 142 facilities nationwide.
“Their playbook is becoming more visible to us,” said Derrick Palmer, vice president of the Amazon Labor Union. “The more we expose their tactics, the less effective they become.”
Labor advocates argue that meaningful change requires both policy reform and consumer pressure. The PRO Act (Protecting the Right to Organize), which passed the House in 2021 but stalled in the Senate, would strengthen protections for organizing workers and ban mandatory anti-union meetings.
“Technology has given employers powerful new tools to suppress organizing,” said Congressman Bobby Scott, who sponsored the legislation. “Our labor laws need to reflect these new realities.”
Meanwhile, a coalition of consumer groups has launched campaigns to raise awareness about Amazon’s labor practices. The #NoTechForUnionBusting initiative asks customers to temporarily pause Amazon purchases during organizing drives.
“Consumers have power in this equation,” said Lisa Chen, director of the Fair Work Coalition. “Amazon responds to consumer pressure more quickly than almost anything else.”
For those concerned about Amazon’s labor practices, advocates suggest several meaningful actions:
For Amazon workers considering organizing, Palmer offers this advice: “Document everything. Know your rights. Build community slowly and carefully. And remember that despite all their technology and money, we still outnumber them.”
As Amazon continues expanding its physical and digital infrastructure across America, the battle over its labor practices will only intensify. The company’s sophisticated union-busting playbook represents the cutting edge of modern worker suppression but as these leaked documents show, even the most powerful corporations have vulnerabilities when their internal workings are exposed to public scrutiny.
This investigation was supported by grants from the Center for Digital Democracy and the Economic Hardship Reporting Project. Amazon workers quoted in this story either provided consent to use their real names or were given pseudonyms to protect them from potential retaliation.
DunePost has established a secure tip line for Amazon employees who wish to share information about working conditions or union-busting tactics – text AMAZON to 474747.
Union-busting refers to the legal and illegal tactics employers use to prevent workers from forming unions, discourage workers from joining existing unions, or disrupt union organizing activities. These tactics can range from mandatory anti-union meetings and targeted terminations to surveillance and intimidation.
Many of Amazon’s tactics operate in legal gray areas. While the National Labor Relations Act prohibits directly threatening or retaliating against workers for union activities, sophisticated companies like Amazon have developed methods that achieve similar results while maintaining technical compliance with the law. For instance, firing someone explicitly for organizing is illegal, but finding performance-based reasons to terminate known organizers often escapes legal consequences.
As of 2025, Amazon’s starting wage is $17 per hour in most locations, though this varies by region. While this exceeds the federal minimum wage, labor advocates point out that when adjusted for inflation, this wage provides less purchasing power than union manufacturing jobs of previous generations. Additionally, the physically demanding nature of the work and high productivity requirements distinguish warehouse roles from other entry-level positions.
Our investigation identified several factors:
Amazon’s official position is that they respect workers’ legal right to organize but believe direct relationships between management and employees serve everyone better. However, internal documents reveal a far more aggressive approach to preventing unionization than their public statements suggest.
In the United States, Amazon has recognized only one union – the Amazon Labor Union at the JFK8 facility in Staten Island – and only after workers won an NLRB-supervised election. The company continues to challenge this outcome through legal appeals. Internationally, Amazon has been forced to recognize unions in countries with stronger labor laws, such as Germany, France, and Italy.
While many large retailers employ anti-union strategies, Amazon’s methods are distinguished by their technological sophistication and integration with existing workplace surveillance systems. Walmart, long known for aggressive anti-union tactics, primarily relies on management training and rapid response teams. Amazon’s data-driven approach represents what labor experts call “Union-Busting 2.0.”
The Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act is proposed legislation that would strengthen federal labor laws to better protect workers’ organizing rights. Key provisions include banning mandatory anti-union meetings, establishing meaningful penalties for companies that violate workers’ rights, and making it easier for workers to form unions. The legislation has passed the House but faces challenges in the Senate.
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