Amazon planned to smear organizer of warehouse walkout

Vice News reports that it has acquired a copy of notes from an internal meeting of Amazon.com’s leadership team, including CEO Jeff Bezos, in which executives discussed how to deal with a planned walkout by warehouse workers in Staten Island concerned about their safety on the job. The goal, according to the notes, was to try and smear the organizer of the action, an employee named Christian Smalls. “He’s not smart, or articulate, and to the extent the press wants to focus on us versus him, we will be in a much stronger PR position than simply explaining for the umpteenth time how we’re trying to protect workers,” wrote Amazon General Counsel David Zapolsky in notes distributed within the company. Mr. Smalls was later terminated after Amazon claimed he violated a company-imposed 14-day quarantine after coming in contact with another worker who tested positive for coronavirus.