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Christian Smalls was fired by Amazon last year when he organized a walkout at the Staten Island warehouse where he was an assistant manager, protesting that Amazon had inadequate hazard pay and protective equipment against Covid. The retail behemoth terminated Smalls for violating social distancing rules. Afterwards, it was leaked to Vice News that in a planning meeting between Amazon's general counsel and Jeff Bezos, it was decided that it was best for the media to see Smalls as being "not smart and articulate", especially as the "face of the union organizing movement." Since then, New York state attorney general Letitia James has filed suit against Amazon for wrongfully terminating him and another worker for speaking out against safety violations. Smalls is now starting his own union, the Amazon Labor Union, because having observed the failure in Alabama for Amazon workers to successfully organize, he believes that's what needed is a union just for Amazon workers, who know more about the company and its anti-union tactics than any established union does. Smalls says that the problems at Amazon are numerous and systemic, and include high injury rates, discrimination against hiring older workers, poor treatment of female employees, overwork, and racism. Labor watchers agree that the odds against Smalls and his fledgling union going up against the billion dollar company are immense, but Smalls continue to have faith that New Yorkers have always been strongly pro-union. Smalls plans to have a stronger workers’ committee to educate and mobilize workers, and that what is needed is a "21st-century" organizing style, including the use of social media to describe Amazon's anti-union tactics, such as sending anti-union texts to workers, posting anti-union signs in bathrooms, and heavy handed union busting.