News and Media

Reported by Harold Meyerson for The American Prospect. So, what’s at the root of the conflict at the railroads? In their very successful effort to raise their profits and payouts to investors, the seven major freight railroads have all but eliminated their competition, downsized their workforces to reduce the share of revenues going to wages,…

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Reported by Josh Funk and Kevin Freking for AP News. Legislation to avert what could have been an economically ruinous freight rail strike won final approval in Congress on Thursday as lawmakers responded quickly to President Joe Biden’s call for federal intervention in a long-running labor dispute. The Senate passed a bill to bind rail…

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Reported by Trains. President Joe Biden today signed legislation averting a railroad strike that would have shut down the national freight network and snarled Amtrak and commuter service. “Our nation’s rail system is literally the backbone of our supply chain, as you all well know. And so much of what we rely on is delivered…

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Reported by Zolan Kanno-Youngs and Emily Cochrane for the New York Times. President Biden signed legislation on Friday to impose a labor agreement between rail companies and workers who had been locked in a bitter dispute, averting a strike that could have upended the economy just before the holiday season. “Without freight rail, many U.S.…

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Reported by Karl Evers-Hillstrom for The Hill. One of the largest railroad unions on Thursday urged senators not to extend the Dec. 9 deadline for rail workers to strike and instead force through a contract that would guarantee paid sick leave for workers. The plea from the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes Division (BMWED)…

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Reported by Timothy Noah for The New Republic. From time to time the Democrats are given an opportunity to demonstrate that they’re still the party of the working class. They have one now, but it looks like they’re going to flub it. A railroad contract negotiated in September by Labor Secretary Marty Walsh was voted…

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Reported by Kevin Freking and Josh Funk for AP News. The U.S. House moved urgently to head off the looming nationwide rail strike on Wednesday, passing a bill that would bind companies and workers to a proposed settlement that was reached in September but rejected by some of the 12 unions involved. The measure passed…

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Reported by Alex Daugherty, Burgess Everett, Tanya Snyder and Nick Niedzwiadek for Politico Pro. The Senate voted Thursday to avert a freight rail strike just days before crucial drinking water, food and energy shipments were set to be sidelined, after hurried talks in both chambers of Congress and a visit to the Senate from two…

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Reported by Joan McCarter for Daily Kos. The Senate voted Thursday to force the railway unions to accept the tentative agreement they had reached with rail companies back in September and averting a potential rail strike that would have begun on Dec. 7. That vote was 80-15 with one—Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)—voting present. The Senate…

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