Policy Statements

The U.S. aviation industry is one of the most heavily unionized industries in the United States, supporting close to 11 million jobs. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reauthorization will expire at the end of this fiscal year and Congress must pass a multi-year bill that advances policies that address workforce issues and make air transportation safer for passengers and employees. According to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), 2023 travel levels in North America are expected to exceed pre-pandemic traffic levels, and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) anticipates a record number of travelers to pass through U.S. airports this summer. Congress should pass an FAA Reauthorization bill supporting critical needs for aviation workers as the industry rebounds from the pandemic.

In March, federal lawmakers introduced the Ocean Shipping Antitrust Enforcement Act of 2023 (H.R. 1696) to repeal the limited antitrust immunity afforded to foreign ocean carriers and dissolve the three major foreign shipping company alliances. This would have serious unintended consequences for dockworkers and other maritime workers that service these foreign ocean carriers at U.S. ports.

Therefore, we oppose the Ocean Shipping Antitrust Enforcement Act of 2023, H.R. 1696, and urge lawmakers to consider the adverse impact that this legislation would have on U.S. maritime workers.

In the wake of the pandemic and its devastating impacts on public transportation both on ridership and revenue, transit systems across the country are facing a funding crisis that could have decades-long impacts on workers and the riders who are dependent on public transportation. While ridership has steadily improved since 2020, budget shortfalls coupled with other factors, including inflation and rising transit operating costs, threaten to exacerbate what is referred to in the industry as the “transit death spiral”: transit agencies cut service or increase fares and in turn fewer people use public transport, leading to even greater declines in revenue.

In the short term, this feedback loop of declining service will have disproportionate impacts on those who rely the most on transit to get to work, medical appointments, the supermarket, and other important needs. In the long term, it will devastate recovery forecasts for public transit while worsening street traffic, air quality, and our overall economy.

The labor movement stands united in our support for good, middle-class jobs; policies that address climate change; and safe transportation that brings equitable benefits to communities across the country. Billions in federal investment across the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) will help achieve that goal in school bus fleets across the country, but as with any federal investment, these dollars must come with conditions that maintain or create quality union jobs for American workers. As with any rapid technological change, electrification threatens to displace the manufacturing workers, drivers, and mechanics who have committed their livelihoods to supporting the country’s education system. To meet our climate goals while ensuring good union jobs, the student transportation workforce must be front of mind as the federal government funds the deployment of electric school buses in communities across the country.

The horrific Norfolk Southern rail derailment in East Palestine, Ohio on the evening of February 3, 2023, highlighted a truth that rail labor unions have been vocal about for years: the freight rail industry has a fundamental disregard for the safety of workers and the general public. Congress must take decisive and comprehensive action to fix it. Rail workers have sounded the alarm for years about the deteriorating safety conditions in the freight rail industry. Actions taken by the Class I freight railroads both before and after the derailment demonstrate that they still have no interest in correcting their business practices that put lives and communities at risk every single day. Sadly, that is because they are driven by one thing, and one thing only: generating the most profit possible, regardless of anyone’s wellbeing but their own. It does not matter to them who gets hurt in the process.

Unfortunately, the East Palestine derailment is not an anomaly. The wide-reaching breadth of safety failures in the freight rail industry contributes to more than 1,000 freight rail derailments a year– nearly three a day. And contrary to the railroads’ rhetoric, the industry’s safety record is getting worse, not better. In fact, the accident and incident rate has increased over the last decade at four of the biggest Class I railroads: BNSF Railway, Union Pacific, CSX, and Norfolk Southern.

Firefighters are essential to a functional, safe transportation system. They play a critical role in not only protecting the public, but also the transportation workers who move passengers and cargo through our air transportation systems and who carry freight, including hazardous materials, through our national rail network. From responding to the derailment of freight trains carrying hazardous materials in residential communities to suppressing fires at airports, our transportation system could not safely function without firefighters. Sadly, too often, the fire service is left ill-equipped, insufficiently trained, understaffed, and underfunded to safely respond to emergencies. This must change.

To improve public safety, we call on Congress to increase funding for firefighter hazmat training; require rail companies to provide advanced notification of hazardous materials traveling through a fire department’s jurisdiction; set a minimum firefighter staffing level at civilian airports; and bring cargo plane and non-public transportation airport safety operations into parity with the regulations for commercial aircraft and airports.

Our nation’s freight rail system has existed for more than 150 years because it has historically been viewed – both by the federal government and the companies that operate on it – as a long-term asset that requires regular investments in order to continue its vitality. These regular investments have been made both by the federal government and freight railroads as part of an enduring long-term partnership. That partnership includes a duty on the railroads to provide rail service in a way that benefits this country.

In recognition of the freight railroads’ importance to the U.S. economy and the American people, Congress imposed a common carrier obligation on the railroads that requires railroads to “provide reasonable service for a reasonable rate upon a reasonable request from a shipper.” This common carrier obligation continues today in federal law and is a bedrock principle of our rail system. To enforce this obligation and ensure that the railroads were not engaging in unfair practices, Congress created in 1887 the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC), which was the first regulatory commission in the history of the United States. Today, the Surface Transportation Board (STB) is the modern successor to the ICC and is the federal agency responsible for enforcing the common carrier obligation of the railroads.

The federal infrastructure law made the largest-ever investment in passenger rail in America, paving the way for a historic expansion of passenger rail service in nearly every state. Now, as federal grants are available to every state to expand passenger rail service, it’s never been more urgent to require grant recipients to comply with laws that protect passenger rail workers who are adversely affected by the grants. Failure to do so could result in displacement of passenger rail workers when we need a robust workforce to meet this planned national expansion of service.

We call on the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) to close a long-standing loophole that allows recipients of federal passenger rail grants to displace workers’ jobs and wages with no recourse. This long overdue action would ensure that passenger rail workers do not lose their jobs because of federally-funded passenger rail projects and would bring these workers into parity with freight rail and public transit workers, who receive similar protections when their jobs or wages are displaced.

For more than a decade, railroad workers’ hard-earned Railroad Unemployment and Sickness Insurance program benefits have been subject to indiscriminate and reckless cuts made by Congress in the 2013 budget sequestration. Railroaders are the only workers in the entire country whose unemployment insurance program is subject to these cuts. The unemployment insurance program often provides the only long-term sickness benefit that most rail workers get when they miss work for an extended period of time. As freight rail workers have spent the last three years negotiating with their employers over short-term sick leave, stagnant wages, and other important benefits, there is no excuse for the federal government to continue to arbitrarily suppress lifeline unemployment and sickness benefits. It’s long past time for Congress to act.

We implore Congress to pass the Railroad Employee Equity and Fairness Act, S.545/H.R.2900, to permanently restore these benefits by exempting the Railroad Unemployment Insurance program from budget sequestration.

In November 2021, President Biden’s promise to enact historic infrastructure investment legislation became a reality when the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) became law. The $1.2 trillion bill was precisely the scale of investment that is long overdue in this country.

In addition to directing record levels of investment in infrastructure, the BIL also enshrined into law many of transportation labor’s key priorities, including strengthened worker protections that support high wages and safe jobs, and powerful domestic content requirements that now must be implemented.