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The New York Post reported that Amtrak paid out over $2.3 million in annual bonuses to 10 executives in 2021, despite the carrier seeing its lowest revenues in a decade.

In the article published by the Post on Oct. 5, the bonuses were reported by Amtrak to be “earned incentives,” but it’s hard to understand the structure of an incentive program that paid an average 58.12% bonus to 10 executives in a year when the company was hemorrhaging money post-pandemic.

It’s also unclear what criteria these bonuses were based upon; The New York Post referenced a Freedom of Information Act request as the source of the salary data.

In regard to this report, SMART Transportation Division President Jeremy Ferguson commented: “Amtrak has received an influx of COVID-19-related government funds the past two years, and this is how they chose to use our tax dollars. Meanwhile, our members were the ones moving trains and the nation’s passengers daily in the face of a deadly pandemic. We will remember the value Amtrak puts on such ‘earned incentives’ when we negotiate the next contract for our Amtrak conductors and other members who worked on the front lines.”

According to the N.Y. Post report, Amtrak Deputy General Counsel William Herrmann’s base salary of $352,898 was compounded by an astonishing bonus of 85.29% for a total of $653,879. This bonus of over $300,000 was only enough to rank Mr. Herrmann fourth in overall compensation at Amtrak, but he did net the highest percentage of his salary in the bonuses, the Post reported.

In the same year these executives were apparently crushing their performance metrics to earn these bonuses, while in all probability working from isolation, the popular employment website Indeed.com put the average salary of an Amtrak conductor at $71,916 over the past 36 months.

Had the average conductor received the same 58.12% bonus these executives made on average, they would have received $41,797. At least one Amtrak general chairperson who was contacted and other Amtrak employees reported 0% in bonuses were received. In addition to not receiving bonuses, the Amtrak rank and file had a much different 2021 than their bosses. These men and women faced large-scale furloughs, and those who stayed working often were forced to chase work to terminals hours away from their homes. This led to distinct declines in their home time and their quality of life. Many of these conductors used Amtrak trains to deadhead themselves to work at their new terminals, which racked up an incalculable amount of uncompensated hours and indirectly allowed Amtrak to skirt federal Hours of Service regulations.

This blatant disregard for safety comes as no surprise when we look at the Section 6 notices that Amtrak has put forward in advance of the next contract negotiation. In these notices, the only item listed under the heading of “Safety” on the company’s vast wish list is that they expand random testing for drugs and alcohol. Apparently, that is the only safety concern facing Amtrak’s workforce in their view.

The executive bonuses might seem par for the course and typical for our day, but even by the standard we have come to expect in corporate bonuses, the Amtrak executives’ windfalls are exorbitant.

The New York Post pointed out in their article that in 2016, 2017 and 2018, Amtrak executives received much smaller bonuses and received no bonuses in 2015 and 2020. With the company ending the year in the red for the 51st consecutive time, it is difficult to imagine what spurred this windfall for the brass of this heavily taxpayer-subsidized company.

To put a bow on it, when asked about bonuses for conductors in 2021, one manager told his crews that, “Our bonus to you is that you kept your job.” It’s hard to encapsulate Amtrak’s view any better than that.

Read the New York Post article and an accompanying graphic breaking down the Amtrak executive pay and bonuses for the 10 executives.

SMART Transportation Division President Jeremy Ferguson, right, appears on Episode 5 of the Between the Rails podcast with host Jon Chaffin of Local 1313, left.

SMART Transportation Division President Jeremy Ferguson appeared in a joint video with Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen President Dennis Pierce on Oct. 7 with both presenting facts regarding the Tentative Agreement (TA) being considered by rail labor.

President Ferguson also answered additional questions regarding the TA on a pair of episodes of the Between the Rails podcast over the weekend as well.

The joint video with the BLET can be seen here.

The first episode of Between the Rails that President Ferguson appeared on is available here.

The second episode of Between the Rails featuring President Ferguson is available here.

As of 11:59 p.m. Eastern on Friday, Oct. 7, the 15-day question-and-answer submission period concluded. The next steps in the process of considering the agreement will consist of meetings between legal representatives of both SMART-TD and the carriers that will address the questions posed by members and their General Chairpersons, and then coming to agreed-upon interpretations to answer these questions.

The completed Q&A document will be released in conjunction with the full text of the TA prior to the start of the 21-day TA balloting period toward the end of October.

A must-watch for all involved members of the SMART-TD and the BLET, SMART-TD President Jeremy Ferguson and BLET President Dennis Pierce have published a joint video regarding the tentative national freight agreement. The presidents describe the challenging political environment surrounding the negotiating process and outline the wages, work rules, and health & welfare benefits secured in the tentative deal.

As the expression goes, “There is strength in numbers.” That being said, our union’s about to get stronger.

Through the efforts of SMART-TD’s Michigan State Legislative Director Don Roach and TD Organizer Nick Greficz (GO 687 in Detroit, Mich.), our union has organized the operating personnel of Lake State Railway Company (LSRC) in Saginaw, Mich.

In this photo courtesy of LSRC employee & future member Tom Scott, a Lake State Railway train operates in Michigan.

In an effort that began in 2020, brothers Roach and Greficz had their goal realized in July when our newest brothers and sisters voted to certify and become a SMART-TD local under GO 049.

At the time of the certification vote, there were 39 LSRC employees eligible to become members of the union; however, as a testament to our new members’ work, LSRC has been expanding its customer base and has been hiring more operating crew. By the time their local is officially part of the union, they estimate that they will have membership in the mid-50s with plans on further expansion.

These new members service rail customers ranging from Wixom, Mich., as far north as Gaylord, Mich., and east to Port Huron. They serve a wide range of industries in their territory. The operation is based in Saginaw, the site of LSRC’s largest yard and hub of operations. In addition to Saginaw, LSRC has yards in Flint, Wixom, Midland, Bay City, Pinconning, Tawas, Alpena, Grayling and Gaylord.

In speaking with SLD Roach, he wanted it to be known that SMART-TD is the only union representing the employees of this short line and will be representing trainmen in all crafts. He said, “It took a few years, but we finally got it done. Organizer Nick Greficz deserves much of the credit. He was the boots on the ground, and we couldn’t have pulled this off without him.”

SLD Roach began his career with the railroad working this line as an engineer for CSXT prior to the Class I leasing the track rights to LSRC. When LSRC took over this line and serviced his old territory as a non-union shop, he took it personally.

“It’s infuriating when Class I railroads lease these tracks to non-union railroads. It makes it personal for me. To see our former members working without the benefits of a union contract is unacceptable. I want to thank the LSRC employees for reaching out to SMART and voicing their concerns.” Roach said.

In the case of LSRC employees organizing into SMART-TD, Director Roach’s personal victory has become a victory for our organization.

For the first time in more than 30 years, this Union has taken the Railway Labor Act (RLA) to its limits. We negotiated. We mediated. We cooled off. We went all the way to a Presidential Emergency Board (PEB) and then back into a cooling-off period again. The coordinated bargaining group was tasked with obtaining the best benefits possible, and we never stopped fighting.

I understand the desire amongst many of you to strike. I know the contempt the carriers treat you with at work and have faced it in negotiations. I agree that this nation needs to know and understand just how poorly you and your families are being treated by America’s Class I railroads. You sacrificed every day for the last several years in the face of this disregard for the sake of your families, your communities and this nation. Working through the pandemic, you endured as critical essential infrastructure workers. You put your health and safety on the line to ensure the world continued to function uninterrupted.

Our supply chain remained intact because of your efforts. How did the carriers respond? With nothing more than “labor doesn’t contribute to profits.” It is clear from not only their words, but also their actions that their sole focus was and still is to satisfy Wall Street investors and their constant desire to maximize profits.

In the face of all this, why did we not strike? It is not due to the RLA, but rather because of the commerce clause contained within the Constitution of the United States of America. The fact is, Congress would not risk any more harm to the supply chain than what the railroads have already committed since the advent of Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR). We were then faced with an ugly reality. We could refuse to negotiate any further and initiate the strike procedures, which, in turn, would have been blocked by Congress with the PEB imposed upon us, or we could come to a tentative agreement that then gives you a voice in these proceedings through a direct up or down vote. Beyond empowering each and every member in the process, the agreement opens new ground and cracks open the door to attendance policies being negotiated at the table, instead of through unilateral edicts from the carriers.

The fact is, Congress would not risk any more harm to the supply chain than what the railroads have already committed since the advent of Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR). We were then faced with an ugly reality. We could refuse to negotiate any further and initiate the strike procedures, which, in turn, would have been blocked by Congress with the PEB imposed upon us, or we could come to a tentative agreement that then gives you a voice in these proceedings through a direct up or down vote. Beyond empowering each and every member in the process, the agreement opens new ground and cracks open the door to attendance policies being negotiated at the table, instead of through unilateral edicts from the carriers.

From the beginning, it was clear that the carriers had no intent of negotiating in good faith. Their primary goal was to break our crew-consist agreements and force crew reductions upon us. In their list of items they wished to accomplish in negotiations (Section 6 notices) they included pay concessions from members so that you would actually have money taken away from you if their objective of single-person crews was rejected. Similarly, their proposed general wage increases (GWI) were a meager 11% with a tiered health care system that would subject you to a monthly premium (moving goal post) that was dependent upon their current health factors, the number of dependents in their respective households, and, in addition, drastic increases to deductibles and out-of-pocket expenses.

Needless to say, there was nothing gained during the early stages of negotiations. While you were hard at work risking your health and safety, the carriers were warm and cozy with the shareholders enjoying record profits while sitting quiet at the table, arms folded and with icy glares blanketly rejecting every proposal we put forth. We demanded our fair share, as you have seen in our published Section 6 Notices. They were absolutely unwilling to negotiate at any point. As a result, and after almost three years of the carriers’ stonewalling, the National Mediation Board (NMB) ordered the parties to mediation.

During mediation, the political climate became more influential, as the elected representatives who would eventually have oversight of our dispute were known to be more labor friendly. This caused the railroads’ bargaining unit to slightly loosen its position, which resulted in their new offer of a 16% GWI (a raise they coined – “reasonable”), but they still maintained their positions on drastic healthcare and work rule changes. Clearly, this fell well short of being acceptable, so we held strong, maintained our position and continued the battle.

Eventually, the parties were released from mediation because it was abundantly clear the carriers were not willing to engage in a conversation, much less meaningful negotiations, and given that we were at a standstill and making zero progress, the cooling-off period commenced.

The carriers drew their line in the sand from the very beginning and claimed that, in their opinion, your demands were excessive and undeserved. We had no other choice but to prepare for a strike; and that’s exactly what we did throughout the cooling-off period. While they were busy courting Wall Street and putting up smoke and mirrors to hide from their own customers and the Surface Transportation Board (STB), we were busy preparing for the first strike in more than 30 years.

The carriers drew their line in the sand from the very beginning and claimed that, in their opinion, your demands were excessive and undeserved. We had no other choice but to prepare for a strike; and that’s exactly what we did throughout the cooling-off period. While they were busy courting Wall Street and putting up smoke and mirrors to hide from their own customers and the Surface Transportation Board (STB), we were busy preparing for the first strike in more than 30 years.

Given your value and worth to this nation as the backbone of America’s economy, President Biden enacted his right, according to the RLA, to impose a PEB in a last-ditch effort for the two sides to reach an amicable agreement. The PEB appointments were publicly named, and given who was selected, we maintained faith that they would have labor’s best interests in mind.

The preparation for the PEB was immediate. Much like court, despite only having three jurors (PEB appointees) as opposed to the standard 12, we prepared to make three years’ worth of arguments in a five-day period. We stretched those days for everything we could to wage our strongest arguments for the highest priority of issues. This included a 28% GWI, no healthcare changes, 15 paid sick days, three additional holidays, a voluntary five-day work week for road service, scope rule and vacation pay changes for our yardmasters, and the abolishment of their egregious attendance policies. The carriers, of course, made all their standard rebuttal arguments on why you shouldn’t be entitled to any of our proposals, and what they wanted to gain from this process.

From day one of negotiations, we never backed down, and we never conceded to any of the items the carriers were demanding. Without question, we knew our only chance at success was to stand united and be willing to go the full distance under the RLA. Had any Union achieved or agreed to a tentative agreement prior to the PEB, it would have most likely established a potentially harmful precedence, which, historically, leaves the remaining unions to face that pattern as the most likely PEB recommendation.

Eventually, PEB 250 concluded and its jury made their ruling. Immediately it was clear the recommendations fell short. The quality-of-life issues we had fought so hard to achieve were negated, namely sick leave and the invalidation of attendance policies. Given that the additional holidays and sick leave were not included, the recommended wage increases should have been greater, and we had sound testimony to support it. The coalition hired an expert economist, and he clearly expressed what was needed in the form of an agreement to recruit and retain an adequate and talented workforce. Our stance was ignored, and the PEB members decided to meet both parties somewhere, theoretically, in the middle.

While this outcome fell short of our expectations, they did rule against the carriers’ proposal to force our crew-consist negotiations into an expedited arbitration (within six months of continued mediation), in addition to denying any forfeiture of pay raises where conductors remain in the cab of a locomotive. The board also rejected the railroads’ proposal for drastic changes to our healthcare plans which would have had long-term financial impacts on the members when they or their dependents received medical care or preventative exams. We were also successful with our position to achieve much-needed changes to the healthcare plan with respect to speech therapy, Autism Spectrum Disorder and an increase in hearing benefits.

While this outcome fell short of our expectations, they did rule against the carriers’ proposal to force our crew-consist negotiations into an expedited arbitration (within six months of continued mediation), in addition to denying any forfeiture of pay raises where conductors remain in the cab of a locomotive.

Additionally, the PEB recommended our position for rest days, but in doing so, commingled this into their decision with the carriers’ demand to implement automatic bids (ABS) and self-supporting pools (SSP) (with modifications to pool/extra board regulations). I want to be very clear that neither SMART-TD nor the BLE-T argued in support of the ABS or SSP. Unfortunately, these were two items that the carriers were successful in receiving, along with the return of the 15% monthly contribution for healthcare premiums.

Following the PEB, it was clear the carriers were not happy with what they had received. This proved to be detrimental to our collective bargaining process as the recommendation would serve as the foundation for any possible agreement moving forward. The carriers were adamant that we would not receive anything more than what was contained within the PEB, period! While most of the other Unions accepted the recommendation as written, we were determined to get more, we dug in, did not waver and continued the fight.

My objective during this time was two-fold; prepare for a national strike and negotiate additional benefits for our members in excess of the PEB recommendations. As a leader, this decision was tough. I had just as many members telling me they wanted to vote on the recommendation as I did that wanted to strike. In addition, I do not agree with, nor will be party to any attempt to restrict your right to vote. You sacrificed too much to not have a say in this process.

So, we pressed on until the 12th hour, when the political powers made it clear, regardless of what was portrayed in the media, that we would not be allowed to shut down America’s supply chain. In the final hours, we were successful in obtaining more, in spite of the headwinds and all who stated it was not possible.

In the final hours, we were successful in obtaining more, in spite of the headwinds and all who stated it was not possible.

As President of this Union, I will not sell members on this tentative agreement. It is my responsibility and duty to provide you with factual information and allow you to make an educated choice, based on the facts presented, that serves you and your family’s interest. Further, it would have been reckless of me to put your fate in the hands of politicians who know very little of the plight of a modern railroad worker in today’s PSR environment. Therefore, as it should be, the vote is now yours. No matter what your collective decision is, I will work to ensure it is heard and is acted upon.

In solidarity,

Jeremy Ferguson,
President — Transportation Division

SMART Transportation Division members now have the ability to update important information including their addresses, email addresses and emergency points of contact thanks to a feature that has been introduced in the SMART Member Portal.

Keeping contact information up to date with your union, be it through your SMART Member Portal account or through your local secretary, is very important. Doing so will ensure that you receive timely and key updates from your union such as ballots, dues receipts, the Transportation Division News or notices concerning other union business.

To establish your Member Portal account, follow these steps:

1. Visit the Members’ Portal page, and if it is your first time visiting, follow the New to SMART Portal link.

2. Select that you are a Transportation Division member.

3. Enter your preferred email address, the number of your TD local (if the local number is below 1000, the lead zeroes should be used) and the last four digits of your Social Security number to verify your membership. (Please note: If your Social Security number is not on file with the union, you will not be able to log in. To get that information placed on file, contact either your local secretary or the Updating or Public Relations Departments in the Transportation Division office in Cleveland at 216-228-9400 or via email.)

4. After following the “Verify my account” link, you will then be prompted to create, then confirm a personal password of at least 12 characters to log into the Portal.

IMPORTANT NOTICE TO TD CONNECT USERS: If you find out that you cannot log in to TD Connect with a password you’ve saved on your browser after creating your Portal account, you may have overwritten it. Just go through the “Forgot Password” process in TD Connect and normal access should be restored.

5. Once the steps above are complete, you will receive an email from SMART member accounts confirming your registration with a link in the body of the message. (Please check your spam/junk email folder if you do not receive it in your regular inbox — especially Gmail, Yahoo! and Hotmail users!) After visiting that link, your account will be activated and verified, and you will be able to explore and customize those union resources that are most important for you.

If you do not activate your Member Portal account by clicking the email link within 24 hours, you will need to re-start the account creation process at Step 1 by re-entering your personal data.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D) of Illinois again has stood shoulder-to-shoulder with rail workers in the battle for national two-person crew legislation.

SMART-TD Illinois State Legislative Director Bob Guy, left, meets with Gov. J.B. Pritzker at the Illinois State Fair on Aug. 16. Pritzker issued a comment in support of the Rule of 2 on Sept. 27.

SMART Transportation Division members and the people of Illinois have even more evidence that Gov. Pritzker has their safety as his priority. The governor’s office submitted comments to the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) on Sept. 27 in support of legislation requiring a two-person crew be in the cab of a number of passenger and freight trains. 

“We want to extend our appreciation to Gov. Pritzker for his support for two-person train crews,” said Bob Guy, SMART-TD Illinois state legislative director. “When the governor was a candidate, he visited my office, and we discussed this important employee and public safety need. Then he followed up that commitment by signing legislation (S.B. 24) in 2019 that requires at least two individuals to operate trains in Illinois.

“Now the governor has furthered that commitment by issuing a letter of support for FRA’s current Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) for crew size safety requirements. Gov. Pritzker and the Illinois General Assembly have made it clear that they support public safety by requiring a two-person crew on trains, and we thank them for that.”

In his submission to the FRA, Gov. Pritzker stated that “adequate railroad operating personnel is critical to ensuring railroad operational safety and security and in supporting first responder activities in the event of a hazardous material incident, grade crossing incident, or mechanical failure.”

The support from Gov. Pritzker is appreciated by the labor community, yet does not come as a surprise. His track record of respect for this issue is clear —  in 2019, he signed S.B. 24 into law, mandating two-person crews for freight trains operating within the borders of Illinois, even when then-FRA Administrator Ron Batory was attempting to quash states’ efforts to regulate train crew size.

To TD members covered by national handling:

Since the announcement of the tentative agreement (TA) yesterday morning, a number of posts purporting to reveal the finalized contents or finalized components of the TA have spread rapidly and are being presented as factual.

They are not.

Anyone who states that they have seen a final copy of the TA, have a copy of the final TA or knows the final contents of the agreement is not being truthful. The final documents have not been fully reviewed by both parties’ legal counsel as is required before it can be presented to the SMART-TD District 1 General Chairpersons, nor has it been distributed to officers or membership.

Per the SMART Constitution, the TA’s language, when finalized, will first be released to General Chairpersons engaged in national handling for their review. This is anticipated to happen as soon as sometime next week.

Once the proper steps with our SMART-TD District 1 General Chairpersons have occurred, factual information will be released on the union website for members for them to evaluate and to carefully consider the tentative agreement.

In the meantime, please do not draw conclusions on the information concerning this agreement from what is being circulated on social media until such time that it comes from our official sites.

We thank you for and appreciate your patience.

— SMART Transportation Division

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 

September 15, 2022

CONTACT: Jamie Horwitz, 202-549-4921, jhdcpr@starpower.net

Statement by Jeremy Ferguson, President SMART Transportation Division and Dennis Pierce, President, Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen

On Tentative Agreement Reached Early This Morning Between Unions Representing Conductors and Engineers and the Nation’s Class I Railroads

Early this morning following nearly three years of bargaining, the Transportation Division of the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail, and Transportation Workers (SMART-TD) and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET), a Division of the Rail Conference of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, reached a tentative National Agreement with the nation’s largest freight rail carriers which includes wage increases, bonuses, and no increases to insurance copays and deductibles. For the first time our Unions were able to obtain negotiated contract language exempting time off for certain medical events from carrier attendance policies. Our Unions will now begin the process of submitting the tentative agreement to the rank and file for a ratification vote by the memberships of both unions. 

The tentative agreement calls for an immediate wage increase of 14% once compounded with an additional 4% on July 1, 2023, and 4.5% on July 1, 2024. In addition, wage increases of 3% effective July 1, 2020, 3.5% effective July 1, 2021, and 7% effective July 1, 2022, will be fully retroactive, for a compounded increase of 24% over the 5-year term of the agreement. The agreement also includes annual lump-sum bonus payments totaling $5,000.

The parties’ Health and Welfare Plan point-of-service costs will remain unchanged; there will be no increases to copays or deductibles and there are no disruptions to the existing health care networks. After over 20 hours of negotiations, we were able to reach an agreement that freezes our members’ monthly health care contributions at the end of the agreement. No additional increases will apply to our monthly contributions while the parties bargain over the next National Agreement. 

The solidarity shown by our members, essential workers to this economy who keep America’s freight trains moving, made the difference in our Unions obtaining agreement provisions that exceeded the recommendations of the Presidential Emergency Board. We listened when our members told us that a final agreement would require improvements to their quality of life as well as economic gains. As a result, this agreement includes agreement provisions that will create voluntary assigned days off for members working in thru freight service, and all members will receive one additional paid day off. Most importantly, for the first time ever, the agreement provides our members with the ability to take time away from work to attend to routine and preventive medical care, as well as exemptions from attendance policies for hospitalizations and surgical procedures.

This tentative agreement provides for the highest general wage increases over the life of the agreement in over 45 years.  SMART-TD was successful in blocking the carriers’ attempts to fast track arbitration on crew-consist agreements, protecting two-person crews for the indefinite future. The carriers’ demands for increases in point-of-service health care costs were blocked, along with their demands to charge married employees with children more for monthly health care contributions. Retroactive application of general wage increases and performance bonuses will provide our members with meaningful back pay checks in the coming weeks.

This agreement would not have been reached without the hard work of President Biden, Labor Secretary Walsh, Deputy Secretary Julie Su and others in the administration. Congressional leaders, including Senators Schumer, Durbin and Sanders, along with Speaker Pelosi listened to your requests and stayed out of our dispute, allowing for an agreement to be reached across the bargaining table, rather than through legislation.

This contract will not become final until our members have an opportunity to review its terms and approve it through a ratification vote.

The new leaders of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, General President Sean M. O’Brien and General Secretary-Treasurer Fred Zuckerman, along with SMART Union General President Joseph Sellers, Jr., played a critical role in helping us get this tentative agreement across the finish line. 

Combined, the BLET and SMART-TD represent approximately 125,000 active and retired rail employees, approximately half of our membership is employed at Class I railroads that are party to this agreement. 

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The SMART Transportation Division is comprised of approximately 125,000 active and retired members of the former United Transportation Union, who work in a variety of crafts in the transportation industry.

The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen represents nearly 57,000 professional locomotive engineers and trainmen throughout the United States. The BLET is the founding member of the Rail Conference, International Brotherhood of Teamsters.

Jeremy Ferguson, President, SMART Transportation Division and Dennis Pierce, President, Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, Teamsters Rail Conference, on move announced by the nation’s largest railroads to further abuse shippers and gridlock the supply chain in order to extort a contract settlement from rail unions:

CLEVELAND — Late on Friday, September 9, the nation’s largest railroads began warning major shippers that they are declaring an embargo on certain types of new shipments five days in advance of the end of the federally mandated cooling-off period at 12:00 AM EDT September 16. They further advised that all rail shippers could be blocked from making any rail shipments well in advance of next Friday’s deadline for a lockout or strike. This completely unnecessary attack on rail shippers by these highly profitable Class I railroads is no more than corporate extortion.

Our Unions remain at the bargaining table and have given the rail carriers a proposal that we would be willing to submit to our members for ratification, but it is the rail carriers that refuse to reach an acceptable agreement. In fact, it was abundantly clear from our negotiations over the past few days that the railroads show no intentions of reaching an agreement with our Unions, but they cannot legally lock out our members until the end of the cooling-off period. Instead, they are locking out their customers beginning on Monday and further harming the supply chain in an effort to provoke congressional action.

The railroads are using shippers, consumers, and the supply chain of our nation as pawns in an effort to get our Unions to cave into their contract demands knowing that our members would never accept them. Our Unions will not cave into these scare tactics, and Congress must not cave into what can only be described as corporate terrorism.

Rather than gridlock the supply chain by denying shipments and potentially locking our members out next Friday, the railroads should work towards a fair settlement that our members, their employees, would ratify. For that to happen, we must make improvements to the working conditions that have been on the bargaining table since negotiations began. Penalizing engineers and conductors for getting sick or going to a doctor’s visit with termination must be stopped as part of this contract settlement. Let us repeat that, our members are being terminated for getting sick or for attending routine medical visits as we crawl our way out of a worldwide pandemic.

No working-class American should be treated with this level of harassment in the workplace for simply becoming ill or going to a routine medical visit. Sadly, the Presidential Emergency Board recommendation got it wrong on this issue. As we have said from the day that they were implemented, these policies are destroying the lives of our members, who are the backbone of the railroad industry.

These employment policies have forced thousands of employees out of the industry and make it all but impossible to recruit new workers. With understaffed operations, these railroads abuse their best customers by refusing to provide deliveries consistent with their legal obligations. These self-appointed titans of industry complain constantly about government regulation and interference — except now when it comes to breaking the backs of their employees. It’s time for the federal government to tell the CEO’s who are running the nation’s railroads into the ground that enough is enough. Congress should stay out of the rail dispute and tell the railroads to do what other business leaders do — sit down and bargain a contract that your employees will accept.

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The SMART Transportation Division is comprised of approximately 125,000 active and retired members of the former United Transportation Union, who work in a variety of crafts in the transportation industry.

The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen represents nearly 57,000 professional locomotive engineers and trainmen throughout the United States. The BLET is the founding member of the Rail Conference, International Brotherhood of Teamsters.