More Perfect Union Profile picture
Dec 13, 2021 8 tweets 3 min read Read on X
Horrifying details are emerging about the tornado disaster at Amazon's warehouse in Illinois, where at least 6 workers were killed on the job.

Before he died, Larry Virden reportedly texted his girlfriend: "Amazon won’t let us leave." He leaves behind four children.
29-year old Clayton Cope rushed to save the lives of his co-workers and warn them about the tornado. He was killed when the warehouse collapsed.

"At least I did get to say I love you," his mother told the local news.
The disaster calls into question some of Amazon's key business practices.

Only 7 of 190 people working at the facility were full-time staff.

Amazon’s dependence on contractors allows them to avoid liability for accidents and undercut union organizing.
nytimes.com/2021/12/12/tec…
Amazon workers are also decrying the company's ban on people carrying their phones on the job, leaving them unable to get updates or contact people during emergencies.

"After these deaths, there is no way in hell I am relying on Amazon to keep me safe."
businessinsider.com/amazon-workers…
Amazon workers are demanding change and accountability. This is Darryl Richardson, one of the leading organizers of the effort to unionize Amazon in Bessemer, Alabama:
Amazon executives sent “thoughts and prayers” to its warehouse workers while forcing them to work through a deadly tornado.

Why didn’t they send Amazon workers home and out of harm’s way?
Amazon has repeatedly forced its workers to keep working through life-threatening natural disasters.

"This is another outrageous example of the company putting profits over the health and safety of their workers," said Stuart Appelbaum of @RWDSU.
45 people were rescued from the Amazon facility in addition to the 6 who lost their lives.

OSHA has now opened an investigation into the fatal warehouse collapse.
cnbc.com/2021/12/13/osh…

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with More Perfect Union

More Perfect Union Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @MorePerfectUS

Aug 12
Companies are increasingly trapping workers with a move that looks a lot like indentured servitude.

The company will pay for training, then when you want to leave the job, the corporation will say you owe thousands of dollars for that training — unless you stay on the job.

🧵
The following article describes a nurse who switched to a better-paying job at a nearby hospital only to wind up with debt collectors at her door demanding she pay her former employer back for a loan she didn’t know she owed.

jacobin.com/2025/08/corpor…
And a cargo pilot who faced a $20,000 lawsuit over job-training expenses at a commercial airline that had just fired him for refusing to fly a plane under unsafe conditions.

jacobin.com/2025/08/corpor…
Read 6 tweets
Aug 7
Amazon tried to build a massive, water-consuming data center out in Arizona. Tucson’s city council unanimously killed it.

We were on the ground to tell the real story of how a community stopped Amazon in their tracks.

A thread 🧵
Back in 2023, Amazon Web Services outlined a plan to build a 290-acre data center—nearly the size of downtown Tucson.

It was one of the largest projects ever considered by the city, and was projected to use massive amounts of water and electricity.

azluminaria.org/2025/07/21/ama…
On June 17, the Pima County Board of Supervisors voted to sell and rezone land for the data center.

The so-called ‘Project Blue’ was immediately marked by a lack of transparency, with the final user hidden and public officials bound by non-disclosure agreements.
Read 9 tweets
Jun 30
Republicans in Congress are currently trying to ram through a bill that would the biggest wealth transfer in history.

Here are some of the most extreme cuts, giveaways to the rich, and impacts that the bill will have.

What they're trying to do is simply shocking. 🧵
Due to the drastic Medicaid cuts in the bill, 1 in 4 nursing homes say they will be forced to close, and more than half would have to cut staff. Image
As a result of clean energy tax credits being killed, household electricity bills in EVERY state will go up.
Read 6 tweets
Apr 21
Florida Republicans and Gov. Ron DeSantis are preparing the most sweeping set of anti-worker bills in the country — rolling back labor protections for kids as young as 14 and even classifying older workers as interns or apprentices.

🚨THREAD🚨
In 2020, more than 60% of Florida voters backed an amendment raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour. But now, in an anti-democratic move, legislators could get around the will of the people.
One senator asked bill sponsor Jonathan Martin in March how the bill would stop companies, like major Florida grocery store Publix, from exploiting the law to pay workers less.

Martin said of the impacted workers: “They could quit.”
Read 9 tweets
Apr 17
Two people were tased at Marjorie Taylor Greene’s town hall in Georgia, where furious constituents demanded answers about insider trading, DOGE, and more.

The Congresswoman faces multiple allegations of profiting from market manipulation. What’s really going on? 🧵
MTG bought between $10K-$150K worth of stock the same day that Trump announced his 90-day pause on tariffs.

The day before, she purchased between $11K-165K in stocks and sold between $50K-100K in Treasury bills.
The stocks? Primarily companies that were most affected by the tariff announcement.

usatoday.com/story/news/pol…
Read 9 tweets
Mar 28
*Signs an illegal executive order. This is called breaking a union contract.

It’s an attack on workers everywhere. Thread. Headline: Trump signs executive order ending collective bargaining with federal unions at agencies involved with national security
Last night Trump signed an executive order instructing 18 agencies to illegally terminate their collective bargaining agreements with 700,000 union workers.
Trump is falsely claiming that is move is about national security, but agencies like the Department of Health and Human services are included.
thehill.com/homenews/admin…
Read 4 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

:(