Amazon reportedly lays off over 150 delivery drivers, union claims it's illegal

Amazon has reportedly fired over 150 unionised drivers in New York, prompting protests outside its warehouse in Queens. The union claims these layoffs are retaliation after drivers participated in a large Amazon workers' strike last December.

Drivers working at Amazon's DBK4 delivery station unionised with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters last September, just a few months before widespread strikes across the online retail giant's U.S. warehouses. Teamsters organised a strike of nearly 10,000 U.S. Amazon workers that December, demanding the company negotiate a fair contract and address concerns such as low wages, workplace safety issues, and claims of "illegal union busting." 

Drivers at DBK4 were among those who took part in the industrial action. As such, Teamsters considers Amazon's decision to lay off over 150 of these delivery drivers retaliatory and thus illegal.

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"Amazon's crime spree has gone on long enough," said Randy Korgan, director of Teamsters' Amazon division. "The Teamsters are fully prepared to put these crooks in their place if they don't reinstate our brothers and sisters at DBK4."

Of course, Amazon sees the situation differently. The company has continually refused to recognise the union, previously alleging that Teamsters has "actively threatened, intimidated, and attempted to coerce" employees and contractors to join them.

According to Teamsters, Amazon claims it didn't "fire" the workers, but merely cancelled contracts with a subcontractor who employed the drivers. Amazon engages third party contractors, in this case Cornucopia, to manage its delivery drivers.

"But it’s all a phony shell game," Teamsters wrote in a statement on Monday. "Drivers wear Amazon uniforms, follow Amazon rules, and work off Amazon’s routing software. Amazon calls the shots. They are the employer and everyone knows it."

"These claims are false and this is just another example of the Teamsters deliberately spreading misinformation to advance their own agenda," Amazon spokesperson Eileen Hards told Mashable. "The truth is that no Amazon employees or delivery partners have ever chosen the Teamsters as their representative in an NLRB [National Labor Relations Board] election, and the NLRB has never directed Amazon to bargain with the Teamsters."

Amazon has previously argued that it doesn't employ its workers, though to little success. Last year, the NLRB determined that Amazon is a joint employer with its subcontractors, wielding enough control over workers' conditions to be considered legally responsible for them. This was a notable victory for Teamsters and its efforts to hold Amazon accountable for the treatment of its workers.

Unsurprisingly, Amazon disagreed with this decision, even going so far as to claim the entire NLRB is an unconstitutional agency in an attempt to block the verdict. This effort was rejected by an appeals court earlier this year.

Pay and working conditions at Amazon have been issues of concern for years, with the company also repeatedly accused of union busting. In 2021, a report by union coalition Strategic Organizing Center found that the rate of serious injuries at Amazon warehouses is almost 80 percent higher than that at other companies' facilities.

UPDATE: Sep. 10, 2025, 10:17 a.m. AEST This article has been updated with comment from Amazon.