The individual who was arrested Monday night after jumping over a police barricade outside of the Metropolitan Museum of Art is Christian Daniel Smalls, a cofounder and former president of the Amazon Labor Union.
The 37-year-old Smalls was arrested at 8:15 p.m. by New York City police officers and taken into custody in the Central Park precinct, according to a spokesperson for the New York City Police Department. Smalls was charged with resisting arrest, obstructing governmental administration, trespass, disorderly contact and failure to obey traffic devices, according to a NYPD spokesperson. He was awaiting his arraignment Tuesday. Smalls is a resident of Lodi, N.J.
His identity was confirmed by Derrick Palmer, cofounder of the Amazon Labor Union. Smalls’ executive assistant Julieta Morales said he was due before a judge Tuesday.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ and Lauren Sánchez Bezos’ lead sponsorship of the Met Gala and the Costume Institute’s spring exhibition “Costume Art” has sparked protests in New York City in recent days, as well as social media debate about corporate greed and workers’ rights. Earlier this week a LED video message calling for improved workers’ rights was projected on the exterior of the Manhattan building where Bezos has an apartment.
A protester holds a sign outside the 2026 Met Gala celebrating “Costume Art” at Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 4, 2026 in New York City.
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Media requests to Amazon and Smalls’ attorney were not immediately returned Tuesday. A spokesperson for Bezos and his wife declined to comment.
Video footage of police officials detaining Smalls in the street Monday night also shows several feet away the Olympic gold medalist figure skater Alysa Liu wearing a strapless red gown on the Met Gala’s red carpet. Her agent Yuki Saegusa had not responded to a media request Tuesday afternoon. A spokesperson for Tom Ford, who was reportedly also nearby during the fracas, said he was traveling and unavailable to comment.
Palmer said he and Smalls met in 2019 as coworkers at Amazon’s Staten Island warehouse and they staged the first employee walkout in March 2020, calling for safer working conditions for Amazon employees during the COVID pandemic. That led to Smalls’ dismissal and Palmer being “written up,” Palmer claimed. The pair then started the nonprofit labor group the Congress of Essential Workers. In 2022, Smalls and Palmer started the first Amazon labor union at the JFK8 fulfillment center, which now has approximately 6,000 members, according to Palmer. Smalls has supported other labor-related initiatives including rallying with the Model Alliance in 2023 to advocate for the Fashion Workers Act.
2023 rally for the Fashion Workers Act.
Photo by Jaka Vinsek/Courtesy
Smalls is no longer affiliated with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, according to a spokesperson for the group. Smalls’ first book “When the Revolution Comes” is due out in June from Penguin Random House.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source wwd.com ’
