Teamsters to White House: ‘We Don’t Need Anybody Getting Involved in This Fight’

Although federal leaders have successfully ended union stalemates in the U.S. and Canada, Teamsters general president Sean O’Brien said he asked the White House to stay out of the union’s contract negotiations with America’s biggest package carrier.

They have until July 31 to reach a new contract agreement. O’Brien is adamant that UPS workers unionized under the Teamsters will strike on Aug. 1 without a deal in hand. The talks have remained at a stalemate since July 5.

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“In my neighborhood where I grew up in Boston, if two people had a disagreement and you had nothing to do with it, you just kept walking,” O’Brien said during a webcast Sunday. “And we echoed that to the White House on numerous occasions and we don’t need anybody getting involved in this fight.”

O’Brien’s statements come as Teamsters-represented workers have practiced picketing at UPS facilities nationwide.

So far, both sides had reached tentative agreements on several issues, including installing air conditioning in more trucks and getting rid of a two-tier wage system for hybrid employees who work weekends but earn less money. A remaining sticking point in negotiations is wage increases for part-time workers, who make a minimum of $16.20 an hour, according to UPS.

The Biden administration has been in touch with both sides, with Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su saying on July 7 that she did not see a need to step in.

The Biden administration’s intervention late last year advanced legislation supported by U.S. Congress that avoided a nationwide railroad strike. Then in June, dockworkers and maritime employers at U.S. West Coast ports ended a 13-month labor battle, striking a tentative new six-year deal after Su brought both sides to the table in San Francisco.

North of the border, a 13-day strike at West Coast ports in Canada concluded after Labor Minister Seamus O’Regan appointed a federal mediator to recommend new settlement terms, resulting in a new tentative deal.

On Friday, UPS said it was setting up “business continuity plans” to mitigate a potential work stoppage. The company will train non-union employees this month to pick up the slack if Teamsters workers strike.

But O’Brien scoffed at the plans, telling union members “UPS can’t train enough managers to do what you all do every single day. They can’t stand in the heat in the back of the truck. They can’t load package cars. They can’t unload trailers. We will win this fight.”

A strike could pry billions of dollars from the economy.

A hypothetical 10-day work stoppage would amount to $7 billion in total economic losses, Anderson Economic Group (AEG) estimated. Total worker wage losses would amount to about $1.1 billion, while UPS customers could incur losses in excess of $4.6 billion, the consulting firm added.

Patrick Anderson, AEG’s principal and CEO, said a UPS strike would result in “lost parts and goods within just a few days.” This interruption would trigger near-immediate lost sales and lost wages, along with “significant and lasting harm for small businesses, household workers, sole practitioners and online retailers across the country.”

The drama at UPS isn’t the only union-related problem impacting top industry players.

The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) filed a complaint against Amazon Wednesday, alleging that the e-commerce giant refuses to bargain with a union representing its Staten Island warehouse workers.

The move comes months after the agency rejected Amazon’s first effort to overturn the results of the unionization vote by “JFK8” warehouse workers—the first-ever group of Amazon employees to successfully unionize. A second challenge from the e-commerce giant is delaying any discussions with the union until the matter is resolved.

An Amazon rep dismissed the labor board’s action as “nothing new.”

“This latest NLRB complaint is nothing new. The validity of the election is still being challenged through the legal process,” said Amazon spokesperson Mary Kate Paradis. “As we’ve said since the beginning, we don’t believe this election process was fair, legitimate, or representative of the majority of what our team wants.”

Meanwhile, the Amazon Labor Union (ALU)—the group at the center of the NLRB complaint—has been rocked by accusation of infighting.

On July 10, roughly 40 Amazon warehouse workers at JFK8 sued the ALU, accusing top union officials of refusing to hold democratic elections to fill leadership posts.

The suit alleges whistleblower-turned-ALU president Christian Smalls—the public face of Amazon’s unionization push—and his “hand-picked” executive committee have changed the union’s bylaws without a proper vote.

Sourcing Journal reached out to Smalls for comment.

Although Smalls said the judge “denied” the suit against the ALU, the court did not throw out the suit altogether.

On Thursday, U.S. district judge Ann Donnelly of the Eastern District of New York declined the caucus’s request for a temporary restraining order that would restrict ALU leaders from retaliating against or disciplining members who are party to the lawsuit.

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