by Ronnie Estoque

“If we don’t get it, shut it down!” was among the shouts that rang through the streets of downtown Seattle yesterday as Christian Smalls led a Black Friday protest against Amazon. Smalls, a five-year employee of the Seattle-based online retail giant, was fired in March of this year for speaking out about workers contracting COVID-19 at an Amazon warehouse in Staten Island, New York. 

Smalls, who since has become an outspoken critic of Amazon’s labor practices, formed his own organization called The Congress of Essential Workers (T.C.O.E.W.) to raise awareness about Amazon’s widely reported labor practices. During the pandemic he led a protest of about 50 Amazon workers to urge the company to close down the Staten Island facility after positive cases of COVID-19 were made public. He was then fired by Amazon following the protest, and on November 12, decided to file a class action lawsuit against the company for a termination he views as unjustified.

“They [Amazon] took away the hazard pay back in June; they took away the unlimited paid time off, and people are still contracting this virus,” Smalls said. “They [Amazon workers] deserve a pay increase; essential workers should be paid as a necessity.”