As General President of the Teamsters Union, I’m always traveling the country to meet members where they are and fight for better contracts up close and in person. I’ve flown hundreds of thousands of miles in the last year alone. I rarely ever question whether I’ll reach my destination safely.
But lately, there’s clearly new pressure in the cabin — and it’s not just the altitude. United Airlines is insisting on offshoring critical aviation jobs in America to Communist China.
The Teamsters union represents more than 10,000 aircraft maintenance technicians at United. These highly skilled workers inspect, repair, and maintain the airline’s fleet of planes. Whether they know it or not, millions of passengers depend on our technicians to travel safely. Despite their important work, United refuses to offer these vital workers a fair contract.
Teamsters technicians are fighting for an agreement that guarantees competitive wages, good healthcare, high safety standards, and job security. In return, United proposed a contract that ignored their demands and intended to send their work to China.
Both parties have spilled a lot of ink on how corporate America has sold our nation to China. The strategy of predatory executives is simple: They lay off U.S. workers and ship those jobs to countries that even more brazenly exploit their workforce than America does.
This reckless race to the bottom has ruined countless lives and hollowed out entire communities. It’s no secret to most Americans that big business will decimate entire industries if it boosts their profit margins. In my decades of going up against big corporations at the bargaining table, I’ve seen the lengths greedy executives will go to cheat workers. United’s radical plan is a new low.
What’s disturbing about United’s insistence on offshoring American jobs to China are the consequences that come with it. This un-American agenda kills good union jobs and risks the life of every United passenger. In the wake of so many recent tragedies in our skies, its proposal to slaughter American jobs is terrifying, insulting, and reflects everything wrong with our economy.
There’s a reason we don’t rely on cheap parts from China to build our most critical infrastructure: It’s junk. It’s one thing to buy a toy for your child that you know won’t last more than a few weeks — but cutting corners to repair American airplanes? It’s evil.
Teamsters nationwide are fighting back against United’s short-sighted cash grab. As soon as our rank-and-filers demanded a strong contract to stop this cycle of greed, United tried to use its old corporate playbook and intimidate workers into taking a bad deal.
REPS. LALOTA AND MENG AMONG PASSENGERS ON PLANES THAT ‘CLIPPED WINGS’ AT REAGAN NATIONAL AIRPORT
Before I took office three years ago, the previous Teamsters leadership accepted a deal that allowed the carrier to ship the jobs of some technicians overseas. This was unacceptable. The Teamsters Union is now leading a renaissance in the labor movement. We are empowering our members at an unprecedented rate. Rank-and-filers are leading the charge in our biggest battles with an energy, militancy, and unity that we haven’t seen in generations. We are fighting more and winning more by returning workers to the driver’s seat. The 10,000 Teamsters at United are ready for that same action. They made that clear when they voted by a 99.5% margin to shoot down United’s shameful contract proposal.
We should be bringing jobs back to the U.S. — not sending them to companies controlled by the Chinese Communist Party. Teamsters are ready to work productively with United to negotiate an excellent agreement that aviation technicians deserve. However, if United remains hellbent on killing our jobs to use substandard repairs in China to “fix” our planes, it will face the reckoning of more than 1.3 million proud American Teamsters.
Sean M. O’Brien is the general president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
This article was originally published at www.washingtonexaminer.com
