Censorship at Powell's Books

Powell’s promotes “standing for free speech, especially when it is hard” — unless it’s speech from their employees.

The information on this page was compiled by the Powell's Union Anti-Censorship Committee, based on reports submitted by Powell's workers. This resource will be updated periodically to reflect new reports.

According to the Powell’s Books employee handbook:

“...[Powell’s Books] has a commitment to fight censorship at all levels....We have a social responsibility to our many and diverse customers to make all kinds of books and information available....Powell’s bookstores are an important community resource. We are committed to providing books, and we are committed to the principles protecting free speech.”

What has Powell’s leadership been doing lately to fight censorship and defend free speech?

November 2023–present: 

Powell’s workers have been subjected to discipline, “problem solving conversations,” and increased scrutiny from Powell's leadership and managers over language used in merchandising materials, product selection for displays — with additional auditing of Heritage and Identity Month displays — and even internal communications. The challenged products have ranged from socks and stickers with swear words to books about fascism, antisemitism, and Palestine. In response to worker inquiries about this increased scrutiny, the Company has cited “brand values,” previously uncommunicated merchandising expectations, and wanting to appeal to an “elevated customer.”

May 2024: 

In response to the noticeable uptick in instances of censorship, scrutiny of product selection and merchandising, and tone policing of Powell’s workers’ speech (and following months of Powell’s leadership ignoring and shutting down attempts by workers to engage on these issues), workers formed the Powell’s Union Anti-Censorship Committee and began documenting censorship-related issues in the workplace. 

June 2024:

Powell’s leadership revised the Company’s Merchandising Guidelines to disallow “promoting an employee’s own personal political viewpoints, political statements, stances, hashtags or slogans.” Neither the Powell’s DEI Committee nor the workers traditionally involved in crafting these guidelines were given an opportunity for input before these changes went into effect, and despite requests from the Anti-Censorship Committee, the DEI Committee, and individual workers, what Powell’s leadership views as “political” has not been clarified.

Also during June (Pride Month), Powell’s leadership removed the following language from the Pride landing page on Powells.com: “With heightened nationwide censorship targeting LGBTQ and BIPOC authors through state laws and attacks on libraries and drag story hours, there’s no better time to celebrate the freedom to read out and read proud.” When pressed for reasons why, Powell’s leadership said the language needed to be updated for “accuracy” and “brand tone.”

July–August 2024:

Powell's leadership removed all mention of a co-sponsor for an upcoming author event after a member of the public reached out to voice concern about the organization in question. The event was for Shane Burley and Ben Lorber’s book Safety Through Solidarity: A Radical Guide to Fighting Antisemitism, and the organization they had enlisted as a co-sponsor was Jewish Voice for Peace Portland, the local chapter of the world’s largest progressive Jewish anti-Zionist organization.

September 2024:

Powell's leadership updated the Banned Books page on Powells.com to remove the themes and topics behind the recent upticks in book bans ("the more recent history of banning books that feature LGBTQ+ themes"). (Here is a report from PEN America, whom Powell’s has hired to facilitate employee trainings on freedom of speech, on the very real statistics showing the erasure of the LGBTQ+ community and of people of color through book bans.)

December 2024:

Just a few days after the “Booksellers’ Best of 2024” list was published and emailed out to newsletter subscribers, Powell’s leadership pulled the list from the website. The list reappeared two weeks later with only 25 of the original 86 bookseller recommendations. Booksellers had been assured in the original solicitation of picks that, similar to the Staff Top 5s project in previous years, all staff recommendations would be featured on the site, though not all would be featured in store. In response to employee inquiry, Powell’s leadership offered a variety of competing explanations for the change, including a claim that the current website infrastructure would not support a list of the original size — despite the fact that it had already supported this list and lists of greater size. These explanations were also undercut by the discovery of a manager's document dividing books from the original Booksellers’ Best list into three categories: “Of Most Concern,” “Questionable,” and “Seem Harmless.” Titles deemed objectionable included many books about Palestine, but also books like Bog Myrtle, a children's fable about workers’ rights.

April 2025:

Powell’s launched a brand new website, and the Arab American Heritage Month page notably had no supporting text, despite similar pages (including the one for Autism & Neurodiversity Acceptance Month) having introductory text.

Perhaps most tellingly, Powell’s leadership chose to omit their former Commitment to Free Speech from the new Powells.com.

How can you tell Powell’s you want them to fight censorship and defend free speech? 

Email us at community@ilwulocal5.com, and we'll pass your message along to Powell's leadership.

Let Powell's leadership know that you don’t support censorship of booksellers; that booksellers’ perspectives and opinions are a valuable part of the independent bookstore experience; and that you appreciate seeing bookseller recommendations that highlight diverse voices, racial justice, and human rights. If you visited a Powell's Books location recently, share something you particularly loved seeing — like the "Read Queer All Year!” display at the downtown store, or the number of shelf-talkers on books by Palestinian and Palestinian American authors, or something else that brought you joy. 

Many customers don’t think to leave feedback unless they’re angry about something — Powell’s leadership could use the positive reinforcement and reminder that our community values the work booksellers are doing.

Note: this is not a call for a boycott; it’s a call for solidarity!

Help us spread the word! 

Print and distribute flyers (to your friends, family, book club, coffee shop, etc.) to spread awareness about the censorship at Powell's Books and help Powell's booksellers build community solidarity! Click one of the images below for a printable PDF.