Joe Biden on Monday called on Congress to avert the rail strike after the largest railroad union rejected a labor deal last week.
A couple months ago Joe Biden bragged he negotiated a deal with the rail unions during an interview with CBS’s Scott Pelley.
In September Biden said the deals were “a win for tens of thousands of rail workers and for their dignity and the dignity of their work.”
Biden’s Labor Secretary Marty Walsh helped negotiate a 24% pay increase over a period of 5 years to union workers.
The Biden Regime also helped negotiate ‘better working conditions’ and ‘caps on what they have to pay out of pocket for healthcare.’
The union rejected that labor deal last week and a nationwide strike is on the horizon.
Congress has the power to intervene in the contract negotiations to avert a strike.
AP reported:
President Joe Biden on Monday asked Congress to intervene and block a railroad strike before next month’s deadline in the stalled contract talks, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said lawmakers would take up legislation this week to impose the deal that unions agreed to in September.
“Let me be clear: a rail shutdown would devastate our economy,” Biden said in a statement. “Without freight rail, many U.S. industries would shut down.”
In a statement, Pelosi said: “We are reluctant to bypass the standard ratification process for the Tentative Agreement — but we must act to prevent a catastrophic nationwide rail strike, which would grind our economy to a halt.”
Pelosi said the House would not change the terms of the September agreement, which would challenge the Senate to approve the House bill without changes.
The September agreement that Biden and Pelosi are calling for is a slight improvement over what the board of arbitrators recommended in the summer. The September agreement added three unpaid days off a year for engineers and conductors to tend to medical appointments as long as they scheduled them at least 30 days in advance. The railroads also promised in September not to penalize workers who are hospitalized and to negotiate further with the unions after the contract is approved about improving the regular scheduling of days off.
DEVELOPING…