(former Amazon employee here - left before the RTO pressure ramped up but still have friends/colleagues there)
A lot of the issue is that middle management and senior management are not on the same page here, in a rare example of middle management's interests being more aligned with rank-and-file workers. A lot of middle managers at Amazon (think L6 through L8) aren't any happier with RTO than the lower ICEs are, and so they're really slow-walking the process: giving false status reports of progress and granting lots of exceptions. (I know one L7 at Amazon who gathered all his directs' badges and beeps them into the office every morning to make it look like people are there). Senior leadership at Amazon is really grumpy about this and trying to find leverage wherever they can to get everyone back even when middle management is lying to them.
A lot of the issue is that middle management and senior management are not on the same page here, in a rare example of middle management's interests being more aligned with rank-and-file workers. A lot of middle managers at Amazon (think L6 through L8) aren't any happier with RTO than the lower ICEs are, and so they're really slow-walking the process: giving false status reports of progress and granting lots of exceptions. (I know one L7 at Amazon who gathered all his directs' badges and beeps them into the office every morning to make it look like people are there). Senior leadership at Amazon is really grumpy about this and trying to find leverage wherever they can to get everyone back even when middle management is lying to them.