What Will the Amazon Slayer Do Next?

Chris Smalls became the new face of labor when he spearheaded a unionization drive at a packing facility in staten island. Now he is trying to replicate that success across the country.

- By Wes Enzinna

IN EARLY APRIL, CHRIS SMALLS DROVE down Canal Street, a blunt in his left hand and an iPhone in his right. He somehow juggled the steering wheel, too, guiding his boat-size Chevy Suburban through Saturday-evening traffic, glancing every so often over the wheel before looking back at the YouTube video playing on his phone. As the leader of the Amazon Labor Union, the first group in the country to successfully unionize an Amazon facility, he had been busy. He had already given two interviews that day, talked to a potential donor, and discussed renting an 11,000-square-foot space for the union's headquarters. In recent days, he had fielded dozens of messages from workers across the country seeking advice about organizing their own Amazon warehouses as well as media requests from places like The Daily Show With Trevor Noah. I've gotten messages like, 'Yo, we need you to save the country'; 'We need you to save gun laws'; 'We need you to save abortion rights, he told me. I'm the savior now of everything.

Spending time with a 34-year-old whose to-do list is topped by Save the world had proved difficult, which is why I was riding around with him in his car-he was juggling me, too. Smalls stubbed out the blunt and turned up the volume on the YouTube video. The clip featured Jimmy Dore, the left-leaning comedian, talking about Smalls's recent appearance on Tucker Carlson Tonight. Smalls was slammed on Twitter for appearing on the program, and he was annoyed by the suggestion that he was a pawn being played by Fox News. Do people think there aren't any Tucker Carlson fans who work at Amazon? Smalls asked. This isn't about Democrats or Republicans, bro-it's about workers. Dore was making a similar point. The video makes Christian Smalls look great, Dore said. I love the fact that he's not wearing a shirt and tie and he's just being radical.