Statement from SMART General President Joseph Sellers, Jr. July 1, 2020
The International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers (SMART) is pleased to endorse Vice President Joe Biden for President of the United States, following a unanimous vote of its General Executive Council.
The endorsement was informed by discussions with and feedback from SMART members and leaders from across the United States who met to discuss SMART issues and which candidate best supports them. Over the past four years, SMART leadership has also met with all the major presidential candidates from both parties, including the incumbent president, and had meaningful dialogue with them regarding issues impacting SMART members.
SMART has engaged with and listened to our members from coast to coast about their views and opinions regarding our union, their jobs and current events that affect their future. This effort was launched to ensure members have a say in shaping the course of our union as it proceeds to advance the needs and viewpoints of the membership.
Biden has a long history of engaging with SMART members and working families in both the sheet metal and transportation industries. The endorsement decision was based on Biden’s strong support of the concerns most important to our members, including the need for two-person railroad crews, retirement and pension security, protection of prevailing wages, and a prioritization of workplace safety. He also is dedicated to acting on a plan for real infrastructure work to enhance employment opportunities for current and future members in the industries SMART represents. SMART members have made it clear they can no longer wait after four years of empty promises for new infrastructure initiatives from the current administration.
From his early years working with local sheet metal workers as a County Commissioner in Delaware, to his frequent meetings with SMART Amtrak conductors during his commute back and forth to Washington, D.C., Joe Biden has been acutely aware of and engaged with the issues on the minds of our members.
After a series of discussions with Biden’s campaign staff, where members’ feedback and concerns were shared with the candidate, Vice President Biden took the time to respond with a video outlining his positions on the issues. His impassioned message in this video proves that Biden is the clear choice for our union and the membership.
SMART is highly engaged in the political process to ensure our issues are advanced and our members’ livelihoods are protected. We also strive to ensure union leadership is transparent and clear with our members when it comes to decisions in the electoral arena. We work to advance our members’ issues by advocating and educating on their behalf while supporting candidates, regardless of party, who stand with SMART members and for issues important to all working families.
Tag: Joe Biden
Commuter rail has been former Vice President Joe Biden’s method of transportation his entire career. During his 36-year run as U.S. Senator, Biden commuted daily from his home in Delaware to Washington D.C., then back home again – a three hour, roundtrip commute. On Friday, January 20, immediately after the inauguration, Biden kept with tradition and took the Amtrak home to Wilmington. See a video clip reported by CNN and posted on Youtube, here.
By UTU International President Mike Futhey –
For UTU members employed in the airline, rail and transit industries, the Obama/Biden victory and U.S. Senate election results translate to:
* More, and more secure, transportation jobs.
* More support to increase funding for public transit, Amtrak, and high-speed and higher-speed rail.
* Strengthened protections of collective bargaining rights and the right to organize the unorganized.
* Assurance of a safer workplace.
* Protection of Social Security, Railroad Retirement and Medicare programs as we know them.
* Retention of the Affordable Care Act’s provisions that allow children to remain on your health insurance policy until age 26, prohibit insurers from limiting maximum patient care payments to those with serious chronic illnesses, prohibit denial of coverage for pre-existing conditions, prohibit copays for certain preventive care procedures, and require insurance carriers to spend at least 80 percent of premiums on patient care.
Moreover, continued control of the U.S. Senate by labor-friendly Democrats better ensures that presidential nominations to federal regulatory agencies are more likely to be approved, and that anti-labor legislation passed by the House of Representatives more likely will be blocked by the Senate.
We have many contacts within the Obama administration who understand the concerns and needs of transportation workers.
A few of the most outrageous members of Congress were defeated. Our National Legislative Office and state legislative departments look forward to working with the new Congress to help resolve the major issues facing our nation. We will continue to deliver a clear and consistent message to all members of Congress.
The vote re-electing President Obama and Vice President Biden was a clear victory for the middle class over the privileged landed gentry’s candidate, who was out of touch with working families.
We will continue to develop good working relationships with the leadership of Congress on both sides of the aisle, and our partners in the rail and public transit industries to grow our transportation alternatives with improvements in rail passenger service, rail freight service and all public transportation services.
We are thankful that many of our friends in the Republican leadership in the House were returned to office.
The most important function of a labor union is to advance the job security, wages, benefits, working conditions, and retirement security of its members. The re-election of Barack Obama and Joe Biden, and the continued labor-friendly control of the Senate, will help to advance those objectives.
WASHINGTON — Speaking to labor’s rank-and-file via an AFL-CIO electronic town hall meeting last week, Vice President Joe Biden warned of “barbarians at the gate” of working families as attacks on collective bargaining and union membership move forward in numerous state legislatures.
“The only people who have the capacity — organizational capacity and muscle — to keep, as they say, the barbarians from the gate, is organized labor,” Biden said.
“And make no mistake about it: The guys on the other team get it. They know if they cripple labor, the gate is open, man. The gate is wide open.”
Encouraging organized labor to continue the fight against extremists who would destroy labor unions, Biden said, “You built the middle class. We don’t see the value of collective bargaining, we see the absolute positive necessity of collective bargaining.”