TexasCHLforum.com

I saw this morning's news that Biden made a phone call to the Sec. of Labor that helped save last minute negotiations and get an agreement with most of the unions to avoid a railroad strike. Biden and his administration are getting a lot of credit for this because of how the strike would have crippled our economy.

Very few of the major media are pointing out that this whole crisis was deliberately created by the Biden administration to play out now and, hopefully, affect the mid-term elections. There is a complicated process for railroads and unions to negotiate, regulated by federal law. If their initial negotiations on their own are not successful, they can ask the National Mediation Board to mediate the disputes. The NMB can mediate for as long as it wants to and only stops when an agreement is reached or when they say mediation is not going to work any further. If the NMB says mediation will not work, the contract stays as is while the president appoints an emergency board to review things and issue a report. The president has 30 days to appoint the board and they have 30 days to issue their report. If the union or the railroad does not accept the report, they have a 30 day cooling off period before a strike can begin.

The NMB released the parties from negotiation this time on June 17. The president created the PEB on July 15. They would have had to report by August 14. The cooling off period before a strike could start would have ended on Sep. 13. On Sep 13, one of the unions said no and voted to strike, but agreed to hold off on it until Sep 29 to allow other unions to negotiate.

Just the times involved makes it look planned. But when you add to it that the normally expected NMB meetings would have continued until Oct, making no strike possible until after the elections in November, it looks worse. And there is no explanation (and none required by law) of why the NMB ended its assistance earlier than expected.

A man made crisis just to boost Biden and the Democrats (and to help their friends - the unions) just in time for the election.