Union solidarity key to Delta workers’ organizing campaign

April 19, 2023 by

Sara Nelson, president of the AFA-CWA, led a rally with leaders of the Teamsters and Machinists at the St. Paul Labor Center.

The largest private-sector union organizing campaign in the world came to St. Paul last weekend, as three unions seeking to bring together 45,000 Delta Air Lines ramp workers, mechanics and flight attendants rallied their supporters at the Labor Center.

The April 15 event drew international union leaders from the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA-CWA), the Machinists (IAM) and the Teamsters, as well as pro-union Delta workers from Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport and Delta outposts in New York, Atlanta and Detroit.

Delta pilots are unionized, but the remaining 80% of its workforce is not. Delta is the only U.S.-based mainline carrier where flight attendants, fleet service workers and mechanics are not represented by a union – for now.

“It is high time that we put a contract in the back pocket of every single Delta Air Lines worker,” said AFA-CWA President Sara Nelson, whose speech drew a thunderous ovation from more than 150 people inside the union hall.

Nelson’s union has supported organizing campaigns at Delta before, as have the Machinists and Teamsters. Sometimes those campaigns overlapped.

But last November the three unions announced an agreement to coordinate their efforts under the “Organize and Fly Together” campaign, with the Machinists supporting Delta fleet workers, the Teamsters supporting mechanics and AFA-CWA supporting flight attendants.

Teamsters Local 120 President Tom Erickson (R) and the Machinists’ Richie Johnsen praised the coordinated union campaign to support Delta workers.

Teamsters Local 120 President Tom Erickson, who serves on International President Sean O’Brien’s Executive Board, said he believes a coordinated campaign – in any industry – offers workers a better chance of making collective gains.

“Coordinated bargaining is not a novel idea,” Erickson said. “Finally, we’re waking up as unions across the company. This coalition should have happened a long time ago. It’s what we used to do back in the 40s and 50s and 60s, and now we’re going to do it again.”

Nelson led the crowd in chanting “I’ve got your back!” as the rally drew to a close.

“We have a lot of differences, and that is what makes us strong,” Nelson said. “But what we have in common is what brings us together. We all need to take care of our families. We all need access to health care. We all need a dignified retirement. We all need to take care of ourselves and our families when we are sick, especially when we get sick on the job.”

Delta is turning massive profits, and its executives are pocketing more of those gains than at other, more unionized airlines. CEO Ed Bastian’s pay was 26% higher last year than his peers.

Delta’s wages are competitive with other large carriers, Machinists Air Transport Territory General Vice President Richie Johnsen said, but it’s only because the airline knows that falling behind would add fuel to workers’ organizing drive.

“We carry that; the union members at other airlines carry that in bargaining,” Johnsen said. “We create that standard, but at Delta it’s a shell that doesn’t offer all the other things that those of us who have a contract enjoy. And that time is done.”

What would a union contract mean for Delta workers?

Nelson said the AFA-CWA contract at United Airlines is worth $100 million more annually than Delta flight attendants’ total compensation, including wages and benefits. The union contract also protects workers from arbitrary firings, establishes safety protocols and gives workers a say in work rules and conditions.

An MSP-based Delta cargo employee, who attended the rally but asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation, said safety standards plummeted after Delta absorbed Northwest Airlines, which was heavily unionized, in 2008.

“When we had a union, they would actually train people to do things safely rather than be forced to work unsafe at Delta,” said the employee, who has 32 years of experience in the cargo department. “We get a lot more pressure now to just get the work done rather than to do it right.”

The safety net for workers who are injured on the job, he said, also disappeared after Delta took over.

“I’ve seen guys get hurt, and they’re forced to leave because they can’t do the work anymore,” he said. “With the union, guys would get rehab for their injuries, or there was a part of the contract where they would … put you into a different job. Now, there’s no such thing.

“They don’t care about us. We’re a number.”

Filed Under: Organizing, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Drawing closer to union elections, Delta workers plan April 4 rally

March 19, 2018 by

Delta Air Lines is the world’s second-largest carrier and a highly profitable corporation, but its 40,000 baggage handlers and flight attendants do not have a union on the job. Not yet, anyway.

Both groups of Delta employees are organizing with the International Association of Machinists, and the union plans an April 4 rally in St. Paul to show labor and community support for the workers’ organizing drive.

“Delta uses all their friends and allies to defeat unions,” former Delta baggage handler and longtime union activist Kip Hedges said. “We must do the same to win union representation.”

Delta, headquartered in the anti-union South, has a shameful track record of union avoidance going back 80 years. After acquiring Twin Cities-based Northwest Airlines in 2008, Delta management won a series of narrow workplace elections that shed the company of most collective bargaining agreements.

In the fall of 2010, flight attendants voted 51 percent to 49 percent against union representation with the Communications Workers of America. Baggage handlers and passenger service representatives rejected Machinists representation by similarly narrow margins.

Both the CWA and Machinists accused Delta of running an illegal campaign to intimidate and harass its employees into voting “no” – bribing workers, monitoring them with surveillance and meddling in the secret-ballot process. Just weeks before voting began, Delta distributed “bonuses” to non-union staff – a final nail in the coffin for the union drive.

Hedges said the company is up to its old tricks again.

“Workers face a Delta management team that is entrenched in its opposition to unionization and proud of their 80-year record as a non-union carrier,” he said. “Delta regularly tries to narrow the ability of rank and file organizers to reach their coworkers through intimidation and rules that flirt with the edge of federal law.”

Still, Hedges reported a “sharp uptick” in the number of Delta workers signing union cards, a trend driven by “ever-harsher working conditions.” And despite record returns, Delta scaled back its profit-sharing initiative last year, frustrating workers even more.

Organizers hope to file for organizing elections with the National Mediation Board in 2018.

The April 4 rally will feature speakers, food and music beginning at 6:30 p.m. at the St. Paul Labor Center, 353 W. 7th St. Doors will open at 6 p.m.

Filed Under: Organizing, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Sun Country pilots protest low wages, pace of negotiations

September 19, 2012 by

Sun Country pilots march in line during informational picketing outside Terminal 2 at MSP Airport.

Sun Country pilots recognize the importance of staying on schedule. They want management to bring that same sense of urgency to negotiations on a new contract with their union, the Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA).

Pilots picketed today outside Terminal 2 at Minneapolis St. Paul International Airport, raising awareness about the slow pace of negotiations with Sun Country – and signaling their frustration to the company about being among the nation’s lowest-paid pilots of Boeing 737 aircraft.

“Compensation is a major issue for us,” said Jake Yockers, a spokesperson for Sun Country’s ALPA bargaining unit.

The pilots have not seen their wage rates increase since 2005, when they agreed to a five-year contract that provided Sun Country, which entered bankruptcy in 2008, with the stability the company said it needed.

The 2005 contract remains in place today, as negotiations on a new contract, which began before the last one became amendable in March 2010, have been slow going.

Pilots say the airline is making money now, and they are looking to bring their compensation back in line with industry standards. Their wages, Yockers said, are roughly half of those earned by pilots at Southwest Airlines, the highest-paid 737 pilots in the country.

“We’ve always helped the company out,” said Yockers, a 22-year veteran pilot at Sun Country. “We love what we do. We love our company. We’re members of the community.

“We’ve had our tough times here, and pilots have always been there for the company. We’re not looking for top-tier pay. We just want a fair wage for what we do.”

ALPA represents more than 160 Sun Country pilots.

Filed Under: Community, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , , ,