Media that empowers working people – that's how we build a More Perfect Union.

Don't Miss a Video!

Access our exclusive reporting and rapid response actions directly in your inbox, so you don’t miss a beat in the fight for working people nationwide.

Be a part of a community backing up independent journalism with action.

Ideas

Have a story to tell or idea to share?
Email [email protected]
© 2021 More Perfect Union Action

Together we can build power for working people.

We’re asking questions that really matter, and telling the stories of people who really need to be seen and heard.

You can support our work by donating today.

Amount

Make It Monthly

Don't Miss a Video!

Access our exclusive reporting and rapid response actions directly in your inbox, so you don’t miss a beat in the fight for working people nationwide.

Be a part of a community backing up independent journalism with action.

Why Railroad Workers May Go On Strike

Railway workers have been stripped of almost all time-off, including weekends, under an extreme new attendance policy.

YouTube Thumbnail

BNSF Railway workers have been stripped of almost all time-off, including weekends, under an extreme new attendance policy. They’ve been working for 3 years with no contract and no raises. A federal judge barred workers from striking, so their families have been picketing on their behalf.

We talked to the railroad workers’ family members who travelled to Omaha, Nebraska, to protest BNSF’s owner Berkshire Hathaway. Below is a full transcript of our video.

Kelly Pettus: They haven’t had a raise in 3 years and they just implemented an inhumane attendance policy without a contract and that’s why we’re standing here, because they’re profiting in the billions and we can’t get a contract.

Families of BNSF railroad workers picketed a shareholders’ meeting on behalf of their husbands, who were stripped of virtually all time-off, including weekends, under an extreme new policy.

Kelly: I am a railroad wife.

Rachel Pharris: My husband has worked for BNSF for 20 years.

Erin Stephens-Marner: I’m married to an engineer.

Rachel: We’re here picketing about the Hi-Viz attendance policy, and so that’s new strict attendance policy that went into effect in February.

Workers fear they’ll be fired if they publicly criticize the new policy. So their families traveled to Omaha, Neb., from across the U.S. to protest BNSF’s owner Berkshire Hathaway, which made a record $6 billion profit from BNSF Railway in 2021.

Kelly: Railroad families are living a different life than most Americans understand.

Erin: He already was on call all the time, but he had the ability to take time off. So if he was sick, if he was tired, he was able to take time off without repercussions.

They live constantly at the mercy of the railroad, and this new attendance policy has created even more of that issue.

Rachel: The HiViz is a point system attendance policy. Yes we have personal leave days, vacation days, things like that, but there has to be availability for you to put in for those. There’s been time that my husband’s needed to take off. He has plenty of personal days but he can’t take off because there’s no allocations available. So he can either miss whatever appointment it was or lay off and take a penalty as far as points.

Erin: They are giving these guys a value on their lives and that is a point system, and they’re taking those away. And they’re saying if you’re sick, if your kids sick, you owe us this back.

Kelly: We don’t expect holidays, we don’t expect weekends, we understand that’s part of the life, but we’re to a point now where you can’t even get sick and your child can’t end up in the hospital without us being punished.

The U.S. rail industry has concentrated, and the major railways have severely cut staffing and time-off to increase profits. Railroad families say the impacts on their lives have been devastating.

Erin: He’ll get a ping on his phone that says, you gotta go to work at 3:00. They break the call. Ya gotta go to work at 5:00. They break the call. You’ve gotta go to work at 8:00. How is anybody gonna get rest for that? And for me, that creates the safety issue. These crews are out there working on little sleep with no rest, sometimes sick because of this new policy. It’s really not safe for our towns.

Rachel: You don’t know when you’re gonna sleep, you don’t know when the phone’s gonna ring, you don’t know if you’re gonna get enough sleep to go back to work. My husband and his engineer did hit a lady and she did pass away unfortunately.

Kelly: For 29 years my husband has gotten up all hours of the day and night. Our marriage barely survived, and we’re making it. We understand that railroad crews are gonna be separated, but when we can’t predict it, and we’re being punished for taking time that we need, it’s unbearable.

BNSF made a record $6 billion profit in 2021.

Erin: You know, we had a daughter that died for heart surgery, she died in heart surgery. And I think there’s no way we would’ve made it through that, there’s no way we would’ve made it through that under that policy. He would’ve been fired. ‘Cause he had to take time off, he had to take that time off. And to me, and I’m gonna get emotional about it, but there are guys out there—I’m hearing these stories of these guys that their wife has cancer, and they can’t take the days off. It’s not ok. It’s just not ok. 

Roughly 17,000 BNSF workers voted to strike over the policy, but a federal judge barred them doing so. Their unions are calling on Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg to intervene and investigate BNSF.

Erin: The railroad created a supply chain crisis and now here we are having to deal with this policy. These guys, they wanna do a good job, they wanna continue to work on the railroad, but I think they feel trapped in this job.

Kelly: We just wanna send the message that a fair contract would make workers happy, and that means a pay increase and an attendance policy that we can work with that doesn’t punish us when our kids get sick or like when my baby ended up in the hospital 2 weeks ago where we spent more time worrying about attendance points than caring for our 2-year-old. 

Erin: There shouldn’t be record profits where they’re not coming to the table and actually negotiating a contract. They’ve worked this 3 years without a contract and it’s not okay.

Related Stories

YouTube Thumbnail
BNSF Railroad Strike Barred by Trump-Appointed Judge
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
Cops, Courts, and Corporations Are Collaborating to Crush Workers
Read More

The Latest

YouTube Thumbnail
What Scorpion Venom Has To Do With Amazon’s Monopoly
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
Our Camera Footage Got Raided. You Won’t Believe Why.
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
Michigan’s Bold New Solution to High Drug Prices
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
Why U.S. Hospitals Are Closing At An Alarming Rate
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
We Went to the Most Unequal Place in America
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
Big Pharma’s 20-Year War On America
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
Whistleblower Exposes Health Insurance Companies’ Most Evil Scheme
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
What Disney Doesn’t Want You to Know About Visual Effects
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
Inside the Exploitation at Vegas’s MGM and Caesar’s Palace
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
How Four Companies Took Over Our Food Supply
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
How Internet Companies like Verizon And Comcast Abandoned Rural America
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
What Nestle and Abbott Don’t Want You to Know
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
Trump Could Lose These Voters. Here’s Why.
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
Chicago’s Radical Solution For Broken Tipping Culture
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
The Hidden Reason Manufacturing Jobs Have Disappeared
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
The Truth About Medicare Advantage
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
Marvel workers won the first union in visual effects history
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
We Uncovered a Shocking Right-Wing Plot to Eradicate Public Schools
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
The Government’s Radical Solution to Lower Drug Prices
Read More
YouTube Thumbnail
This New Deal Jobs Program Is Coming Back
Read More