In a recent interview, President Joe Biden defended the deal he’d negotiated between the railroad system and its employees back in September, claiming no one else could’ve done it the way he did.
In fact, he was so proud of this “victory” that he and several other Cabinet members had a public celebration in the Rose Garden on the 15th of September.
This is when the initial deal was accepted by both parties, only for four different rail worker unions to pull out later.
Joe believes no one other than him could’ve landed deal with railroad workers
This put an immense burden on Congress, giving them little to no time to devise a plan that would avert a devastating railroad strike right ahead of the holiday season.
early Oct Biden secretly bribed the railroad workers to wait to strike until after the midterms so that prices wouldn't go up? Its happening right now just as I was told 2 months ago. superprick
— Ted Nugent (@TedNugent) November 28, 2022
During a press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron, Biden was asked whether the rail workers deserve more than one day of paid sick leave, like the rest of the Americans do, which clearly annoyed the president.
This came up mainly due to the fact it was the one point Biden wasn’t negotiating for. It’s been a turning point in the deal, as it was exactly what led several worker unions to reject the proposal, even though they do receive paid vacation, short-term disability and personal leave days.
Instead of giving a coherent answer to this completely legitimate question, Biden was unnerved by the fact the question even came up, claiming he did everything in his power to get paid leave for everyone, not just the railroad workers.
The railroad fight is NOT just a typical industry vs. union dispute
Union bosses & Biden sold out the workers to make a deal
Tens of thousands of workers rejected their deal
And now Biden & the union bosses want Congress to impose their deal on the workers
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) December 1, 2022
It’s the Republicans’ fault once again, according to Biden
To no one’s surprise, Biden ended up blaming the lack of paid sick leave on Republicans, which has become a common narrative for the Biden administration, despite there being no conclusive evidence of those claims.
Putting a final nail in the coffin, Joe said whatever he’d negotiated was obviously better than what they had previously, alluding to the notion the US is one of the few nations that doesn’t have paid leave for its workers, which is categorically untrue.
The rail agreement was voted on by the House lawmakers this Wednesday, although the seven-day-long paid sick leave provision fetched quite the divided response, with only three Republicans voting for it, allowing it to narrowly pass by only 14 votes.
In 1992, Senator Joe Biden voted AGAINST ending a major rail strike.
He argued that by intervening, Congress would be “rewarding” the railroad companies for years of bad faith negotiation.
Yesterday, President Biden asked Congress to intervene to prevent a rail strike. pic.twitter.com/eAq9mDzAwd
— More Perfect Union (@MorePerfectUS) November 29, 2022
The vote puts us one step closer to avoiding the detrimental rail strike that workers announced if their demands are not met; the bill is currently headed to the Senate where it’ll hopefully receive a vote before the end of the week.
Even though he clearly pushed a deal that didn’t include paid sick days to Congress, Biden made the bold claim he’ll be fighting for additional paid leave in the future, assuming he’ll stick around for long enough to follow up on those promises.
The announced strike is set to begin on December 9th. If the Senate vote fails to avert it, we’re in for one hell of a holiday season, all thanks to Joe’s “masterful” negotiating skills.
