Women's Clothing Boutique in Garner, NC

GARNER, N.C. -- North Carolina is a state that is generally hostile to unions. Amazon is a company that is, historically, extremely hostile to unions. Now an upstart union is attempting to represent more than 4,000 Amazon workers at one of the online retailer's facilities there.

The National Labor Relations Board is overseeing a six-day vote starting Monday, with votes due to be counted Saturday. A win by the union, Carolina Amazonians United for Solidarity and Empowerment, or CAUSE, in the town of Garner would be just the second Amazon facility to see a union win a representation vote, following a 2022 election at one of the company's major sorting and distribution centers in Staten Island, New York.

Amazon, the nation's second-largest private-sector employer, has faced increasing pressure from unions in recent months. And despite the fact that North Carolina has the lowest percentage of union membership among workers of any state - only 2.4% of workers overall, which is less than one-quarter of the national average - leaders of the union's efforts said that they are confident about the outcome of the vote.

"As you imagine Amazon has been doing everything to make sure we don't win," Italo Medelius-Marsano, an Amazon worker and one of the leaders of the campaign, told CNN. "The amount of money that Amazon is pouring into this, the people they're flying in to take us on, the propaganda - all of that tells us they're scared. That fear tells us that they know we're on the verge of something great."

The company said that it is confident that workers in Garner, a town of 35,000 just outside of Raleigh, want to keep the sorting and distribution warehouse union-free.

"We believe our employees favor opportunities to have their unique voice heard by working directly with our team," said a statement from Amazon spokesperson Eileen Hards. "The fact is, Amazon already offers what many unions are requesting: safe, inclusive workplaces, competitive pay, industry-leading benefits."

The company said it pays workers in the facility a starting wage of $18.50 an hour and a top pay of $23.80 an hour. The union organizers said they'll be pressing for $30 an hour.

"I would challenge anyone to say $20 an hour is a livable wage here," said Medelius-Marsano. "In the Raleigh area, that's a slap in the face. Given the profits at Amazon and what it's worth, $30 an hour is incredibly reasonable."

Amazon has a market cap of $2.4 trillion and made $59 billion in net income in 2024, nearly double what it made the year before.

To become official, they need a majority vote but some workers like Cheryl Massingale, who's worked at the facility for four years, are voting no. She said it's not worth risking what they already have.

"We probably will get a raise but it will not be $30 an hour that's just not realistic here," Massingale said. "I'm sorry but if you want $30 an hour you should go work somewhere else."

Supporters are looking to their friends up north for a road to success. Members of the first Amazon facility to unionize in Staten Island New York joined them at their rally.

"It takes a lot of organizing, a lot of organizing a lot of persistence you're gonna get discouraged but you keep going," New York Amazon Union Leader Miss Mena said.

But they said one challenge is New York's laws are much more pro-union than North Carolina's.

"I know that the south is harder because of the right-to-work state, the laws are different here but you know the south is resilient, the people down here are resilient and the energy is high," said New York Amazon Union Leader, Chris Smalls.

Amazon's history of fighting union efforts

But even if the union wins, it could take years to negotiate a first contract. Amazon has continued to challenge the union representation vote it lost at the Staten Island facility in court, nearly three years after the NLRB certified the vote results. And it has refused to negotiate with the Amazon Labor Union, the upstart union that won the vote, or the Teamsters union, with which ALU members voted to affiliate last year.

"As we have shared before, we strongly disagree with the outcome of the election at (Staten Island)," said Hards. "Both the NLRB and the ALU improperly influenced the outcome and that is why we don't believe it represents what the majority of our team wants." The official total showed that 55% of the workers who voted supported the union.

Organizers in Garner said they have gotten support from other unions that are trying to organize other Amazon facilities and that it has learned from past union defeats at the company. Amazon has defeated union organizing votes twice at a facility in Bessemer, Alabama, as well as at a second Staten Island facility next to the one that voted for the union, as well as one just outside of Albany, New York.

But the organizers in North Carolina said the fact that theirs is an independent union is an advantage.

"Amazon paints us as an outside group," said Ryan Brown, a union organizer who was fired by Amazon in December, after five years at the company. "But the workers here know we're not outsiders. Those of us who have lived in the South all of our lives know our culture, which is that we're skeptical of strangers, of outsiders."

Brown and the union claim that his firing was due to his union activity. The company denies this, saying it was due to "repeated and well-documented incidents of misconduct."

But despite Amazon trying to hold back union representation, it has been facing greater pressure than ever before from union efforts.

Unions stepping up efforts at Amazon

Workers at Whole Foods in Philadelphia just became the first at the Amazon-owned grocery chain to vote for a union.

And the Teamsters announced a six-day strike just before Christmas.

In addition to the workers in Staten Island, that strike primarily involved drivers who deliver packages for Amazon exclusively but who the company argues are not its employees, because they officially work for "independent contractors."

CAUSE filed complaints of unfair labor practices against Amazon on Thursday, which is not unusual, as the company already has multiple such complaints filed against it with the NLRB. The labor agency staff and administrative law judges have found against Amazon in numerous cases.

One of those judges issued a decision finding substantiated unfair labor practice allegations against Amazon, requiring the court to set aside the 2022 rerun election in Alabama and ordering a third election there. But before that can happen that case needs to be considered by the agency's full board, and upon taking office, President Donald Trump fired a sitting NLRB board member for the first time in history, which means there is no longer the quorum necessary to hear such cases. The fired board member is challenging her dismissal in court.

So even if a union is to win the vote, it will face an uphill battle to win the contract it says its members deserve, given Amazon's track record fighting unionization efforts in the rest of the country. The union leaders said they're ready for that.

"When you look at the civil rights movement, it was years and years to get the justice some Americans weren't getting," said Brown. "I am committed to this fight for the rest of my life."

"The workers want Amazon to recognize their humanity and not treat them like a robot," said Medelius-Marsano. "Our cheap labor has helped produce so much wealth. But they won't even meet us halfway."

The-CNN-Wire & ABC11's Tom George contributed to this report

[Stay on top of transportation news: Get TTNews in your inbox.]

When Amazon.com Inc. opened a warehouse in Garner, N.C., almost five years ago, Mary Hill was excited to snag a full-time job helping her neighbors get essentials during the COVID 19 lockdowns. Now Hill, 69, hopes to organize her 4,700 co-workers into a union so they can bargain for $30 an hour and longer breaks.

Hill and other organizers won the right to hold a union election this week to determine whether workers at the facility will be represented by the upstart Carolina Amazonians United for Solidarity and Empowerment. The group came together during the pandemic, when Hill and many of her colleagues felt Amazon prioritized shipping products over keeping workers safe.

“The word I like to use is ‘disillusioned,’ ” she said of her job packing customer orders. “I thought Amazon was a great place to work, but then I realized it’s really just a sweatshop.”

Amazon ranks No. 1 on the Transport Topics Top 100 list of the largest logistics companies in North America, No. 12 on the private carriers list and No. 1 on the global freight TT50.

Garner, a community of 40,000 just south of Raleigh, is the backdrop for the latest attempt by workers to unionize the nation’s second-largest private employer. Voting is scheduled to end Feb. 14, after which the National Labor Relations Board will count the ballots.

Today is the day!@amazoncause is taking the fight to Amazon in North Carolina. The South will be heard. Starting today, and running through this Saturday, workers will be casting their votes on whether to unionize RDU1 fulfillment center. Show your support! pic.twitter.com/6PKRlB4ODj — Fight for a Union (@FightForAUnion) February 10, 2025

Victory is hardly assured. North Carolina had the lowest union membership rate in the country last year at 2.4%, well below the national average of 9.9%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Amazon pay of as much as $19 an hour is in line with other blue-collar jobs in the region, which is home to three major research universities and a well-paid workforce.

A 15-year hiring spree has made Amazon a tempting target for unions eager to claw back some of their bargaining power. Forty years ago, more than one in five US workers belonged to a union — twice as many as today. Amazon’s growth in transportation and warehousing has undermined one of organized labor’s remaining private-sector footholds, prompting the International Brotherhood of Teamsters to target the company.

“We’ve always said that we want our employees to have their voices heard, and we hope and expect this process allows for that,” Amazon spokesperson Eileen Hards said in an emailed statement. “We believe our employees favor opportunities to have their unique voice heard by working directly with our team. The fact is, Amazon already offers what many unions are requesting: safe, inclusive workplaces, competitive pay, industry-leading benefits.”

READ MORE: Amazon to Face Legal Action After Layoffs in Quebec - TT

U.S. unions have notched only two big victories at Amazon, and both occurred in places were labor still holds some sway. In 2022, workers at a Staten Island warehouse voted to join the Amazon Labor Union, another upstart that has since affiliated with the Teamsters. New York’s union membership rate of 20.6% is second only to Hawaii’s. Last month, workers at an Amazon-owned Whole Foods Market in Philadelphia voted to be represented by the United Food and Commercial Workers International union. Pennsylvania’s union membership rate is higher than the national average at 11.7%.

Amazon has prevailed in two union elections at a facility in Bessemer, Ala., which the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union is trying to organize. Alabama’s union membership rate, at 6.6%, is well below the national average. A NLRB judge ruled a third election should be held following allegations of company misconduct during the votes in 2021 and 2022. Amazon has denied any wrongdoing.

Hill said her group has communicated with the Amazon Labor Union for tips on how to win and also reached out to workers in Bessemer to absorb lessons from their loss. Organizers also likened their campaign to the civil rights movement in an effort to make their efforts resonate.

Even if her group wins, Hill knows the fight with Amazon will probably last years. After all, the workers in Staten Island still lack a contract.

Want more news? Listen to today's daily briefing above or go here for more info

Meanwhile, the Trump administration has forced out two top leaders at the NLRB, which is responsible for enforcing most private-sector employees’ right to unionize or take collective action. Already, Amazon is citing the firings in an effort to invalidate the Whole Foods vote.

Hill said Amazon workers in Garner include transplants from New York and other states where unions are more common, a factor that she says helped spread awareness about the benefits of organizing.

“We’ve all been frustrated with management at one point,” Hill said. “There’s always some common ground we can come together on.”

Saturday's vote totaled 829 workers voting yes to unionize and 2,447 workers voting no.

GARNER, N.C. (WTVD) -- A union vote at the Amazon facility in Garner on Saturday failed to pass.

The voting, which was over six days, began on Monday, Feb. 10. Saturday's vote totaled 829 workers voting yes to unionize and 2,447 workers voting no.

Amazon spokesperson Eileen Hards released a statement following the vote saying:

"We're glad that our team in Garner was able to have their voices heard, and that they chose to keep a direct relationship with Amazon. We look forward to continuing to make this a great place to work together, and to supporting our teammates as they build their futures with us."

Organizers from Carolina Amazonians United for Solidarity and Empowerment, or CAUSE said while they're disappointed in the result, they're not defeated.

"We're not going to stop organizing, this was just the first step," said Amazon worker and CAUSE member Italo Medelius. "We at least now know that we have around 1,000 people that support us inside that building that's a lot of people so we're going to go back we're going to regroup and we're going to make sure that RDU1 knows that our presence hasn't been defeated."

Medelius said it was always an uphill battle, first getting enough signatures to force a vote, and then facing opposition from Amazon.

"They were denigrating our name saying we were some outside group, not the people inside that we were trying to take your dues even though we're a right-to-work state," he said.

The union had been pushing for more benefits along with a $30-an-hour wage. But despite the vote, they said as the cost of living continues to rapidly increase in the Triangle, their fight for better conditions and wages is even more important.

"Yes, we deserve more money because Amazon is a corporate empire, the fourth richest company in the world. But we really deserve respect and we deserve a safe workplace," said Amazon employee Benny Koval.

Report a correction or typo

Copyright © 2025 WTVD-TV. All Rights Reserved.

Amazon workers in North Carolina have voted against unionizing as the retail giant once again prevailed in its fight against labor organizing.

Around 4,300 workers at a warehouse in Garner, N.C., a suburb of Raleigh, were eligible to cast ballots over the past week. They voted whether to join the grassroots union called Carolina Amazonians United for Solidarity and Empowerment, or CAUSE.

Workers voted nearly 3-to-1 against unionizing. Federal labor officials' tally showed 829 votes in favor and 2,447 votes against, with 77 ballots set aside as challenged by either the union or the company.

Union organizers, who are current and former workers, said they would push for higher wages, more reliable hours, better safety measures and other changes. They faced a staunch opposition campaign by Amazon.

Amazon, the nation's second-largest private employer in the U.S. after Walmart, has argued its employees benefit from working directly with the company — without the involvement of unions.

"The fact is, Amazon already offers what many unions are requesting," Eileen Hards, a company spokesperson, said in a statement on Friday. The statement cited "safe, inclusive workplaces, competitive pay, industry-leading benefits — including health care on day one, pre-paid college tuition, and a 401k with company match — opportunities for career growth, and more."

The company has long fought off efforts to organize its packers, delivery drivers and other employees. In January, workers at one Amazon-owned Whole Foods location in Philadelphia voted to become the first unionized store in the chain. Whole Foods has since asked the National Labor Relations Board to disqualify the union's win, in part because the federal agency no longer has enough board members to certify the vote since President Trump fired a Democratic member.

The company continues to legally challenge its first unionized warehouse, in New York, nearly three years since the historic vote. In that time, the finances and internal cohesion of that upstart Amazon Labor Union deteriorated. The group has joined forces with the powerful International Brotherhood of Teamsters.

The Teamsters separately organized some of Amazon's delivery drivers, though the company also does not recognize this representation. In December, the union led drivers and warehouse workers in picketing multiple locations around the U.S., trying to draw more people into the union fold and press Amazon to begin negotiating collective-bargaining contracts.

Amazon is also appealing a November ruling by a federal labor judge that ordered a third union election — a re-redo — at a warehouse in Alabama. In the original 2021 vote, workers overwhelmingly rejected the union. U.S. labor officials later found Amazon illegally influenced the result. The second election's results remained too close to call for over two years, as the union and the company accused each other of breaking labor laws.

Amazon workers and federal labor investigators have filed numerous complaints alleging labor-law violations and illegal union-busting tactics by the company, which Amazon has denied and legally challenged. In fact, one of the company's lawsuits has questioned the very existence of the National Labor Relations Board, arguing its structure violates the Constitution.

Editor's note: Amazon is among NPR's recent financial supporters.

Two organizations of vastly different sizes have one more day to win the votes of 4,300 workers at Amazon’s hulking fulfillment center in Garner.

The campaign conducted outside and within the Wake County warehouse known as RDU1 has involved music, hamburgers, informational sessions, banners and charges of unfair labor practices. At stake is whether RDU1 employees unionize and the labor movement notches a monumental victory in the nation’s least unionized state.

The winner should be learned Saturday.

Opposing the union is Amazon, the nation’s second-largest private employer. The company has followed its blueprint from past elections, holding voluntary employee meetings to sway workers against the union and displaying posters with statements like “unions run their business with your money” around the four-floor, 2 million-square-foot facility.

Along a steel barricade lining RDU1, Amazon has hung banners aligned with its corporate RDU1 campaign slogan, “Together, we soar.”

“The fact is, Amazon already offers what many unions are requesting: safe, inclusive workplaces, competitive pay, industry-leading benefits,” company spokesperson Eileen Hards said in an email. She then emphasized that the group seeking to negotiate pay and working conditions at RDU1 has never done so before.

This is true. The union is a 3-year-old organization called Carolina Amazonians United for Solidarity and Empowerment, or CAUSE. What makes CAUSE’s fight against a $2.5 trillion company stand out is that the standalone organization is not formally affiliated with a larger union.

“Going up against a major employer with an independent union is very rare, in fact almost unprecedented,” said Abraham Walker, a sociology professor at Fayetteville State University.

Yet one of the other examples Walker mentioned was in 2022 when the independent Amazon Labor Union successfully unionized an Amazon warehouse in Staten Island, New York. (ALU has since affiliated with the Teamsters.) This facility, called JFK8, remains the only unionized Amazon facility in the United States, though Amazon-owned stores like Whole Foods have organized.

CAUSE was launched three years ago by RDU1 item packers Ryan Brown and Mary Hill, who had become concerned over the company’s COVID-19 safety policies. The group today seeks to earn workers $30-an-hour minimum starting wages and full-hour paid breaks during shifts, which can last more than 10 hours. Amazon says it pays U.S. customer fulfillment workers between $18.50 and $29.50 an hour, varying with location, at an average around $22.

In late December, CAUSE filed for an election after enough employees filled out union authorization cards to indicate their interest. The National Labor Relations Board set a seven-day voting window for mid-February. Voting began at the warehouse Monday and goes until 12 p.m. Saturday. If a majority of voters approve the union, CAUSE wins.

“The folks who know best how to organize Amazon are those who work at Amazon,” said Zoey Moretti Niebuhr, chair of the union’s community committee. “We think worker power is the answer to fight back against this company.”

RDU1 is massive. Its sprawling footprint hovers over a section of Jones Sausage Road, about a 10-minute drive south of downtown Raleigh. On Thursday, Moretti Niebuhr flipped hamburgers at a CAUSE support station just beyond the steel barricade. In the parking lot, Amazon played loud pop music which CAUSE members said was part of the company’s campaign.

Music and food are legal aspects of a union campaign. But both sides have also been accused of unfair labor practices in recent weeks under the National Labor Relations Act. On Feb. 12, a charge accused CAUSE of unlawful coercion. Since January, Amazon has received three charges in Garner — alleging unlawful dismissals, denial of access, and coercion.

Amazon has a record of unfair labor practices. A prominent union campaign at its warehouse in Bessemer, Alabama, is headed to a third election after the NLRB found the company violated labor law during the initial vote. At the start of 2025, Amazon has close to 350 open or settled unfair labor practice charges across 27 states. In one example, the NLRB found Amazon “unlawfully interrogated and threatened employees” at the JFK8 facility in New York.

North Carolina is a right-to-work state, which means Amazon employees won’t have to pay union dues even if CAUSE wins the election and negotiates on their behalf. The Tar Heel State annually ranks near the bottom for union membership, and in fact finished 50th out of 50 states in 2024 with only 2.4% of workers in a union.

Enjoy Triangle tech news? Subscribe to Open Source, The News & Observer's weekly newsletter, and look for it in your inbox every Friday morning. Sign up here.

The News & Observer

919-861-1238

Brian Gordon is the Business & Technology reporter for The News & Observer and The Herald-Sun. He writes about jobs, start-ups and all the big tech things transforming the Triangle. Brian previously worked as a senior statewide reporter for the USA Today Network.