“Boycott the Bezos Met Gala” Posters Emerge Across NYC
The signs protest the sponsors of this year’s event, Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchéz, and target Amazon's alleged worker exploitation and links to ICE.
The Met Gala is coming in less than three weeks, and while the annual event has always drawn some form of protest or criticism for its theme, attendees, and context in the grand scheme of things, this year already feels a little on the nose. In posters wheatpasted across New York City, activists are calling for a boycott of the 2026 event, whose lead sponsors, Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez, have also been appointed honorary co-chairs.
The posters take aim at Amazon's alleged exploitation of warehouse and delivery labor, as well as the company's links to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) through its cloud computing platform, Amazon Web Services (AWS).
Behind the poster designs is the British political activism campaign Everyone Hates Elon, which made them available as free downloadable files for people who want to continue sharing the message. A press release from the group notes that it was able to crowd-source over $10,000 in a week to finance its cross-city sweep to “expose and embarrass Jeff Bezos” ahead of the gala.
“People are being murdered by ICE. Iran is being bombed. Democratic institutions are being dismantled,” a spokesperson for the group emphasized in a press statement. “Yet Anna Wintour’s Vogue and the Met Museum think it's OK to celebrate one of Trump’s oligarchs.”
In addition to its original target, Elon Musk, the Everyone Hates Elon has staged multiple viral stunts targeting Bezos and Meta's Mark Zuckerberg in their calls to tax the rich. The campaign has also taken repeated aim at Donald Trump and the disgraced Prince Andrew for their connection to Jeffrey Epstein.
The designs depict a stanchioned red carpet and camera flashes spotlighting a urine-filled plastic water bottle or a tear gas canister. The former references the long-standing concern that many Amazon delivery drivers often resort to relieving themselves in disposable water bottles in order to meet the company's demanding daily quotas. The company initially denied the fact when called on it via social media, but later partially admitted to its truth by framing the problem through the lens of public restroom accessibility.
The symbol has since come to represent the broader exploitation of Amazon's workforce. In addition to long-held accusations of union-busting behavior, the company has been accused of conducting business as usual in a warehouse after the death of an employee on-site — one such instance allegedly occurred in Oregon last week.
Accompanying the tagline “brought to you by the firm that powers ICE,” the tear gas canister points to how the federal agency relies on cloud storage through AWS to host its data in order to operate and conduct mass deportations at its current scale.
It's unclear how effective the campaign's call to boycott the Met Gala will be this year. In 2024, dozens of pro-Palestine protestors were arrested during a group action outside of the event, which catalyzed a “Celebrity Block Party” to diminish the impact of celebrity influence in response to industry silence on Gaza.
Regardless, some critics note in the comments of Everyone Hates Elon's Instagram posts that boycotting the Bezos-sponsored Gala must be followed by boycotting Amazon itself for any shred of efficacy.
