May 4, 2020

“Designed to Create a Climate of Fear”: Amazon VP Quits After Company Fires Activists

“It’s evidence of a vein of toxicity running through the company culture,” he said.

Smith Collection/Gado/Getty

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Tim Bray, a vice president at Amazon, announced he’s leaving the company because of the “chickenshit” firing of activists who spoke about conditions at the company’s massive warehouses.

Bray, a high-level engineer at Amazon Web Services, laid out his complaints and reasons for stepping away in a damning blog post worth reading in full.

It centers on Amazon’s warehouse policies, which—as we’ve reported on before—have been the target of employee strikes for increased safety, pay, and workplace protections. Workers say there is a lack of personal protective gear, inability to stay six feet apart, and not enough cleaning. (The company told Mother Jones, in a previous statement, that safety measures, including masks, temperature checks, and hand sanitizer are “standard” across facilities; that social distancing has been implemented; and that protest numbers “grossly exaggerated.”) Last week, a group of Amazon employees, organized under the banner “Amazon Employees for Climate Justice,” held a town hall to discuss conditions in the warehouses.

Amazon’s response has been retribution.

Chris Smalls, a worker at a State Island Amazon warehouse, was fired soon after leading a protest (Amazon says for violating a 14-day quarantine). And two organizers with Amazon Employees for Climate Justice—Emily Cunningham and Maren Costa—were fired for organizing the town hall, Bray says. “The justifications were laughable,” he writes, “it was clear to any reasonable observer that they were turfed for whistleblowing.”

“It’s evidence of a vein of toxicity running through the company culture,” he continues. “I choose neither to serve nor drink that poison.”

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PLEASE—BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things it doesn’t like—which is most things that are true.

We’ll say it loud and clear: At Mother Jones, no one gets to tell us what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. The deadline’s almost here. Please help us reach our $150k membership goal by May 31.

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