A tentative agreement has been reached to avert a freight rail strike that could have disrupted commuter rail services across the US, Joe Biden said on Thursday.
A strike would also have dealt a major blow to Democrats two months before midterm elections in which they will try to keep control of the Senate and the House.
A rail shutdown could have hit food and fuel supplies – freezing almost 30% of US cargo shipments by weight, stoking inflation, costing the US economy as much as $2bn a day and affecting the energy, agriculture, manufacturing and retail sectors.
Biden hailed “a win for tens of thousands of rail workers who worked tirelessly through the pandemic to ensure that America’s families and communities got deliveries of what have kept us going during these difficult years”.
Unions have said the industry is in crisis, with companies taking huge profits while the workforce shrinks.
This week, Ross Grooters, a locomotive engineer for Union Pacific in Iowa and co-chair of Railroad Workers United, told the Guardian: “The job is just really becoming fewer people doing more work faster. We’ve seen in this country all workers getting more and more squeezed.
“These railroads are making billions of dollars. In the past, we’ve been well compensated for being on call 24/7, 365 days a year. That’s been eroded over the course of my career in the last two decades to where it’s just not appealing enough to attract people into the workplace.”
Negotiations between a dozen unions and railroads including Union Pacific Berkshire Hathaway’s BNSF, CSX, Norfolk Southern and Kansas City Southern stretched for more than two years, leading Biden to appoint an emergency board to help break the impasse.
Administration officials hosted talks into the night on Wednesday, aiming to secure an agreement with unions that represent 115,000 workers. Failing to reach a deal before the deadline of one minute after midnight on Friday would have cleared the way for strikes.
Announcing the deal in the small hours of Thursday, Marty Walsh, the US labor secretary, said: “The Biden administration applauds all parties for reaching this hard-fought, mutually beneficial deal. Our rail system is integral to our supply chain, and a disruption would have had catastrophic impacts on industries, travelers and families across the country.”
Biden said: “These rail workers will get better pay, improved working conditions and peace of mind around their healthcare costs, all hard-earned. The agreement is also a victory for railway companies who will be able to retain and recruit more workers for an industry that will continue to be part of the backbone of the American economy for decades to come.
“I thank the unions and rail companies for negotiating in good faith and reaching a tentative agreement that will keep our critical rail system working and avoid disruption of our economy.”
Shares of US railroad operators rose between 2.4% and 2.9% in early trade.
Before news of the deal, it emerged that Biden’s popularity rating had improved substantially from his lowest point this summer though concerns about his handling of the economy persist, according to the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
Support for Biden recovered from a low of 36% in July to 45%. During bleak summer months when gasoline prices peaked and lawmakers appeared deadlocked, Democrats faced the possibility of blowout losses to Republicans in November. A string of legislative successes followed.
However, the president’s approval rating remains underwater, with 53% of US adults disapproving of him, and the economy continues to be a weakness. Just 38% approve of Biden’s economic leadership as the country faces stubbornly high inflation and Republicans try to make household finances the axis of the upcoming vote.
A rail strike would have affected some commuter lines, as many Americans head back to the office after the Covid pandemic. Other lines would not have been hit, depending largely on whether the commuter line owns its own tracks or uses tracks owned by freight companies.
There are few feasible mass-transit alternatives for long-distance commuters.
The largest commuter rail systems, all in metropolitan New York, were not affected. But before talks succeeded, the Metra system in Chicago said it was expecting disruptions on at least four of 11 lines.
Commuter services in the Los Angeles and San Francisco Bay areas would also have been affected by a strike. The Sounder system in the Seattle area would have been forced to close. About 5,000 people ride Sounder trains each day – down from about 20,000 before the pandemic. In greater Minneapolis, transit agencies planned to offer bus service to replace the smaller Northstar service.
The Association of American Railroads, which represents the freight rail industry, estimated that half the commuter rail systems in the country depended at least in part on tracks owned by the affected freight railroads.
John Cline, director of government relations for the Commuter Rail Coalition, an industry trade group, told the Associated Press there are 36 commuter rail lines in the US and the impact of a strike would range from “potentially catastrophic” to negligible.
