Bernie Sanders, chair of the Senate Budget Committee, highlighted the unionization effort at an Alabama Amazon plant while announcing a bill targeting high CEO pay. The Amazon fulfilment center in Bessemer, Ala., where workers are voting by mail on whether to form a union. (Courthouse News photo/Daniel Jackson) (CN) — Jennifer Bates began working at the Amazon plant in Bessemer, Alabama, in May 2020. She said she quickly found that while the company touted its $15-an-hour wage, the job was grueling, “so impersonal and at times just plain weird.” Testifying before the Senate Budget Committee Wednesday via videoconferencing software, Bates described conditions in the plant sitting to the southwest of Birmingham that led workers there to push to unionize: two, 30-minute breaks during 10-hour shifts; constant monitoring; elevators in the four-story plant only used for merchandise; the company only communicating to workers via text or an app.