Policy Statements

As we approach the halfway point of President Biden’s first term in office, transportation labor calls on the administration to continue prioritizing an ambitious regulatory agenda that delivers improved safety, creates good union jobs, and drives economic development. This includes promulgating regulations required by unmet mandates that have languished for years without appropriate attention, new regulatory requirements enacted by the historic Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), and forward-thinking proposals that address the safety and economic conditions of today’s transportation network.

In the wake of the Boeing 737 Max accidents, Congress and aviation safety officials rightly recognized that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) had ceded far too much of its own regulating authority to private interests. The reforms that are still being implemented by the Department of Transportation (DOT) and the FAA should ensure that proper regulatory authority is in place to greater improve aviation safety and prevent any future catastrophes and loss of life. This mindset, however, needs to extend to every aspect of aviation safety. For 20 years, TTD and its affiliated unions have been calling for greater oversight of FAA-certified foreign contract repair stations that perform work on U.S. aircraft. Despite several legislative victories that require the FAA to promulgate rules governing these foreign repair stations, we have yet to see meaningful progress or reforms to ensure that the work being done in these stations meets the standards that we set here at home. President Biden has publicly and definitively called for action on this issue and it is past time for Congress and the FAA to rectify this problem though both legislative and regulatory action.

In an era of unprecedented instances of violent and unruly passengers, alongside the evergreen threat of terrorism and other dangers in the skies, it is clearer than ever that flight attendants and pilots must be given the necessary tools to best protect both themselves and the traveling public. In order to address both the current spike in violence as well as unacceptable and dangerous behavior that has existed since long before the pandemic, Congress must take action.

Prior to his inauguration, President Biden announced the details of his Build Back Better plan, a bold economic platform that prioritizes major investments in our nation’s infrastructure along with some of the strongest labor principles ever put forward by an American president. With the second short-term extension of the FAST Act surface transportation law quickly approaching and an economic recovery that continues to prove sluggish in the wake of COVID-19, the American people simply cannot afford for Congress to wait another day to enact the president’s agenda.

The Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO (TTD) and our 33 affiliated unions have long highlighted the need for investments that are squarely in line with the president’s Build Back Better platform. That includes reliable, long-term reauthorizations of our nation’s highway, bridge, public transit, and passenger rail programs along with other large-scale infrastructure investments that would bring all other sectors of our aging transportation and infrastructure not just to a state of good-enough, but instead, solidly into the 21st century.

In response to the decline of U.S. flag vessels available to protect America’s interests at home and around the globe, Congress established the Tanker Security Program (TSP), which would reinforce our current tanker fleet, lower our reliance on foreign flag vessels, and create new, good jobs for American workers. TSP was authorized by Congress in […]

Over the course of the last several months, the U.S. economy has suffered severe breakdowns in the supply chain as bottlenecks and service meltdowns have become a fact of daily life. The resultant delays and inefficiencies in the freight network come at high financial and even environmental costs as products fail to reach secondary manufacturers […]

It is an outrage that on any day, working people who staff the front lines of our passenger transportation system face brutal assaults and abusive and unruly behavior by the users of the system. The reality is this has long been a problem that plagues our transportation workforce. The pandemic has only made it worse […]

The United States Postal Service (USPS), and the hundreds of thousands of employees who power it, is the thread that binds our nation together, plays a central role in our vast transportation system and keeps communities connected. Its importance to day-to-day life and our economy became ever more apparent during the pandemic, as letter carriers […]

The strength of the U.S.-flagged, U.S-crewed merchant marine fleet continues to be an essential linchpin for economic security, military readiness, and the availability of good jobs with strong wages and benefits in the domestic maritime industry. However, for decades, the U.S. fleet and U.S. mariners have been buffeted by Flag of Convenience shipping models, shifting economic and military climates, and missed policy opportunities. Bold decisions and investments will be necessary to guarantee the enduring viability and growth in the U.S. maritime sector. With strong leadership from the Biden administration and recent Congressional action, it is apparent that we have arrived at a unique opportunity for transformational growth and increased ability to compete for a larger share of America’s foreign trade.

Since 1975, the Fly America Act has required that when federal employees and their dependents, contractors, grantees, and property travel internationally on trips financed by the federal government, they do so on U.S.-flagged air carriers. Like many other laws and regulations in the transportation sectors that require some form of domestic preference, the requirement seeks to combat unfair competitive practices that U.S. carriers encounter in many of the countries where they operate, including the financial subsidization of carriers by their host country. These requirements ensure that federal spending on travel brings positive economic impacts to both domestic air carriers and their employees. As such, the Fly America Act represents a strong example of the policies touted by the President’s Made in America Executive Order, and we call on the administration and Congress to take action to uphold the Act’s requirements.