Amazon threatens to close more than a dozen NYC warehouses if Mamdani-backed labor bill passes

Amazon has threatened to shutter all of its last-mile warehouses in New York City and eliminate thousands of jobs if the City Council passes legislation requiring the company to directly employ its delivery drivers rather than use third-party contractors, according to Manhattan Daily.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani threw his public support behind the bill on Monday, escalating a standoff that has split labor advocates, small-business owners, and delivery workers into sharply opposing camps.

Corporations like Amazon build billion-dollar business models by insulating themselves from accountability through a system of exploitative subcontracting.— Zohran Mamdani, NYC Mayor

The legislation — Intro 518, known as the Delivery Protection Act — would bar companies from subcontracting core warehouse and delivery work at last-mile facilities and require that workers be directly employed by the facility operator. The Teamsters union is among its key backers.

Amazon currently works with more than 40 local Delivery Service Partners — small businesses that collectively employ over 5,000 people across the city. The company says the bill would make that model illegal.

But as written, this legislation would directly undermine that commitment — threatening the small businesses that deliver to customers, putting the jobs of more than 5,000 of their employees at risk and forcing us to consider relocating delivery operations outside of the city.— Kelly A. Nantel, Amazon spokeswoman

The bill's opponents organized their own show of force Monday, gathering delivery workers and small-business owners at Thomas Jefferson Park in East Harlem to urge the Council to reject the measure. The New York Delivers coalition, which includes FedEx, claims as many as 10,000 city delivery jobs could be at risk — including an estimated 3,500 last-mile positions in Harlem and four adjoining Council districts.

One of those small-business owners is Rudy Cazares, a New York City native who operates an Amazon Delivery Service Partner and also holds a FedEx contract. He says the bill would end his business outright.

I would be shutting my business down. I have no business.— Rudy Cazares, Amazon Delivery Service Partner operator

Cazares employs roughly 130 people, with drivers starting at $23.75 an hour and experienced drivers earning up to about $27 an hour. He pushed back on the characterization of companies like his as mere buffers between Amazon and workers, arguing that he hires his own employees, operates his own vehicles, and runs an independent business — even if Amazon controls package sorting and staging.

There's been no dialogue that includes the small businesses that are the ones making this happen.— Rudy Cazares, Amazon Delivery Service Partner operator

The Teamsters, for their part, dismissed Amazon's warnings as a pressure tactic.

Amazon will say or do whatever it takes to deny workers stronger rights and wages and abdicate its responsibilities for its own employees, which is why journalists are obliged to expose these greedy corporate tactics and not serve as stenographers for the company's anti-worker propaganda.— Matt McQuaid, Teamsters union spokesperson

The economic stakes for consumers are also in dispute. A study by consultancy AKRF found the legislation could add $664 per year to the average New York household's costs, and warned that moving delivery operations outside city limits would result in slower and more expensive deliveries. The Business Council of New York State called the bill a straightforward price hike for consumers.

This law is just going to raise prices for consumers.— Steve Smith, Business Council of New York State spokesperson

City officials have urged caution. Carlos Ortiz, deputy commissioner of external affairs for the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, told an April Council hearing that the city wants to avoid unintended consequences. Council Speaker Julie Menin, according to a spokesperson, was waiting for the bill to complete the legislative process and receive full stakeholder input.

The bill has supermajority support in the City Council but remains pending, according to Manhattan Daily, as heavy lobbying continues on both sides. New York Delivers notes that 82% of the last-mile delivery workforce does not hold a college degree and 84% is non-white — a demographic profile that supporters of the bill say underscores the need for stronger worker protections, and that opponents say makes the job-loss risk especially serious.

The fight over the Delivery Protection Act reflects a broader national tension over the gig-economy subcontracting model that Amazon and other logistics giants have used to scale last-mile delivery rapidly — and the question of who bears responsibility when workers in that system are injured, underpaid, or let go.

Why it matters — If the bill passes and Amazon follows through on its threat, tens of thousands of New Yorkers could lose jobs or face higher delivery costs — but if it fails, the subcontracting model that unions say leaves workers without basic protections continues unchecked.

Sources differ on Whether Amazon's threat to leave NYC is a genuine business decision or a pressure tactic: Likely to follow through, based on resistance to similar changes elsewhere and Quebec precedent, per former Amazon executive Brittain Ladd (manhattandaily.com) vs Amazon will say or do whatever it takes to deny workers stronger rights — the threat is anti-worker propaganda, per Teamsters (nypost.com)

Reported by manhattandaily.com, nypost.com