¶ Sean O'Brien joins the Chuck ToddCast
Well, joining me now is one of the most I think interesting people in American politics today. It's the head of the Teamsters Union and Sean O'Brien. Before we get started with sort of your life in the literally in the center lane of American politics these days, the Teamsters in general have a reputation, you know, my lifetime, of being the less partisan of the major unions that you know,
¶ Teamsters have reputation of being a less partisan union
while you know, when I was growing up, most of the labor movement was Democratic. But if there was a labor union that would be open to supporting Republicans, it was the Teamsters. Walk me through that. What is that relationship? Why is that What would you say explains that history?
Well, I think what explains the histories. We are one of the lodgest We always have been one of the largest, I believe, most influential unions in the country. You know, we've been around since nineteen oh three. But we're very diverse. We're a very diverse union. We always have been and
I think we always will be. And you know there's no secret that you know, we have endorsed Republican candidates prior, but historically we've always went with Democrats, and I think you know that I'm a lifelong Democrat, so I was brought up in a Democratic state, so you know, you
always pulled that party line. But you know the history, if you look back in history, it wasn't always that way with the teams As union, you know, I think the philosophy has always been, let's try and work with the people that are going to work on behalf of the best interests of our members. And that's why we're a little bit different than most because we're a lot, we're transparent, we're inclusive, and we want to support people that are going to support our issues regardless of what
their political affiliation has. And that's always been the case
¶ Teamsters have a very diverse membership
pretty much.
Uh. The if I were to paint a picture of the average Teamsters member of a Teamsters union, it's a it's a truck driver. But that is I think being very myopic. Tell me, you're actually a very diverse set of workers, uh that are that are members of the Teamsters Union. Walk my listeners through that.
All right?
The easiest way to describe it, because it is a very complicated, uh description if you try to you know, sector bisector, so building trades or a company or electrician. Uh, you're a plumber, right. Everybody knows that's what you are. The teamster is the best way to say it, and I say it all the time. We represent everybody from airline pilots to zoom keepers and everybody in between.
I remember, like you guys have been helping to organize Amazon worker we have.
Yeah, we we've uh, we've actually taken that fight on. We joined forces with Amazon Labor Union, which success organized in New York. And you know, there's no secret that we have a longstanding relationship bargaining relationship with UPS, which is one of the was the largest UH package delivery companies,
¶ Amazon could be the biggest threat to organized labor
and so it was a natural fit for us to uh joined forces and women organizing uh the direct employees and also organizing the third party leasing arrangement, which is a scam and a shell game, which we all know about. So that's been our biggest focus. Amazon not just to the teams is Union, not just to you know, germane
to us. But they're probably going to be the biggest threat to organize labor UH because they have their fingers in so many different industries and so many different uh you know, technologies that could affect us.
So you know, let's talk about automated robotic. Look, Amazon is going hard at replacing the human being. They want to replace the human being as fast as possible. Amazon's not alone, They're just the largest entity with the resources to do it. You're try to protect human labor.
Well, we have to protect human labor, because you know, without human labor, where are these folks gonna go. And that didn't get the opportunity to go to college, that didn't get the opportunity that that some people got, and look, you know, AI is probably the biggest threat to the human population. And I think, you know, and I've been
¶ The threat of AI to workers
focused on this meeting with people that I normally wouldn't even talk to because my concern is, like, what is what effect is AI? Because it's so it's so complicated. But I think what we're going to see with AI and this automation and all these corporations that are falling in love with it, you're going to see the the upper management of a lot of these corporations be affected by AI because they're not gonna need all these analysts,
they're not gonna need all these white collar jobs. So you're going to see a further disparity once that middle layer management is you know, basically affected and they lose their jobs, You're going to see CEOs pay continue to grow because all the savings. My mission is to make sure that we capture capture that money for the folks that are still working these blue collar jobs and create hopefully opportunity for retraining in new jobs as a result
of the implementation of technology. And Amazon, to your point, doesn't care about the humans. They care about they care about their brand, and they care about their profits, and that's it.
You know, I'm pretty convinced that the issue of twenty twenty eight is going to be like, if you're a presidential candidate and you don't have a policy on AI
¶ AI job displacement could be central issue to 2028 campaign
job displacement, you shouldn't be running for president. No, it's probably going to be the table stakes, right, I.
Mean, twenty twenty eight is going to be like, so, I just did some little bit of research on you because I'm a huge fan, but I'm a little bit more mature because I'm six days older than you. I was born Actril second, nineteen seventy two.
No, kiddy, look at that, all right.
But it's gonna be like twenty twenty eight has the potential to be like, do you remember WWF what was that big event they used to have every a summer.
Slam, Summer Wrestlemanians, WrestleMania.
Yeah, like WrestleMania, but ye you.
Put the rumble at the end where there's a million people in the ring.
But now, yeah, it's happening right now across the street from where I'm at. But no, I mean, look, this is a huge threat to the American workforce, and whether you're a Republican or Democrat, you have to have a solution in support network to support workers whose jobs are going to be at risk. Maybe even you know extinct and you're spawn on. I mean, everybody falls in love with convenience and technology. We're all guilty of it. You know, we own something online, we hit that button, we want
it yesterday. But what cost does that come at? Right? Does it comes at a cost of someone's job?
What is your leverage? So let's take UPS UPS a big you know the UPS drivers, and UPS says hey man, we love these robot trucks and we're going to have these robot drivers. What's your leverage to protect your human.
My leverage is the collective Bogging agreement we negotiated where
¶ What leverage do the unions have when it comes to AI?
we negotiated language that any technological change needs to be agreed upon. If there's a disagreement, it's subject to arbitration. But we also know we also negotiate provisions that UPS has to maintain a certain level of full time jobs and create full time jobs as a result of it.
So you know, we're already in stages and it's been going off a ten of twelve years where UPS in the warehouses, where we have fifty four percent of our membership out of three hundred and forty thousand apart time is to get full time benefits, health and welfare, pension. So we're very, very sensitive to any type of job elimination.
But we we're convinced and we have committees where because of our collective bogging agreement, we can identify opportunities to create new jobs as a result of technology being implemented. So that's the difference right now between an unionized company like UPS versus non union FedEx and or Amazon. We have the ability because we negotiated those terms and conditions.
But you know, if you're a non union Amazon employee inside the warehouse, you know chances are at some point in time, if Amazon has the opportunity to replace you with a robot. They are going to do their best to do that. And I got to tell you, I think we all know technology it's not full growth and the best I always tell people, like when we're fighting about these autonomous vehicles, which is disturbing to me, you know,
and I'm a Democrat. It's disturbing to me when you have governors in California, in Illinois and Colorado who say, hey, I want to support working people. I want to support you know, the creation of jobs. And when you work bipartisan on a state level and you have agreed to legislation that's going to mandate human operators and commercial vehicles and it gets to the governor's desk and they veto it, what does that signal this just happened.
So you brought this up? You look you it's like you read my research on you, and but I was
¶ 3 Democratic governments vetoed bills for automated trucks
about this was very recent legislation. And these are three Democratic governors who all are all want labor support. I probably all believe, you know, would say they're very supportive of collective party. But Jared Poulos, Dab Pritzker, Gavin Newsom, what's their explanation for why they vetoed these bills.
That is a great question. So what do they tell you? You're probably going to find this how to believe Newsom is not a big fan of Sean O'Brien. Have been critical of him because he's in love with big tech. I mean, that's the bottom line, right.
You see tech as adversarial.
I see tech as adversarial because the script has been flipped right from where the report publicans were fifteen years ago. Now the Democrats seem to be holding their seats and falling in love. I call it like Stockholm syndrome. You know, some of these governors have fallen in love or some of the Democrats have fallen in love with their captor, right, and they don't know the result, the catastrophic result. I talked to the governor from Colorado, right, called him up
before because we were getting word that. You know, he was on the fence whether he was going to veto it or sign it into legislation. No, I forget. I was in Times Square, I was at another event, and I called him. I said, look, this is going to be detrimental to working people. It's going to be detrimental to CBL license holders. It's not just a union issue. I go, there could be like two hundred and fifty
thousand people affected by this. He's like, I love the team, says I go, okay, this is where I've always supported you and everything you've done. I don't know whether that's true or not. I'm saying to myself, he says, but I just can't be with you on this one. I said, really, this is the one that really matters. This is the only one that matter is. I said, where are you going to put those two hundred and fifty thousand well to why I'm going to set two hundred thousand, two
unre fifty thousand people that lose their job? Where are they gonna go? I said? And furthermore, I drove a truck my whole life. I said, you know, the best technology and the best information is a human hot instinct in their brain. They can react quicker than any computer. What are you going to do when you're platooning a vehicle wearing two hundred forty thousand pounds and a malfunction kills a family of four? Are you gonna be okay with that? Because I certainly am not going to be
okay with it? And he says, oh, you know what, don't worry about that stuff. It's ten to fifteen years down the road. I said, no, it's ten to fifteen minutes down the road. But that's the perplexing stuff for us. And that's where you know, I get criticized sometimes because they'll say, well, you're a labor leader and you're criticizing the Democrats. Well, I'm a label leader that criticizes the Republicans.
I'm a labor leader criticizes the independence as well when you're not making reasonable decisions on how it's going to affect working people. More so, your constituents who if they don't have a job, where do they go? They want, they go, They go on the they go on the they go on the done.
Look, I look at your job is to you have one job, right, You're there to protect your workers. You're there to do that. I get that. What is you also have to be responsive to technological change? What's your recipe?
¶ How are unions dealing with technological change & automation
If you could go back to Polus, you could go back to pritzkerg and say, look, I get that. You want to you want to be able to innovate. You want to be able to to to allow automation to have a chance in some areas, where maybe automation will be better in certain in certain things. You know, you see things with microsurgeries, right that maybe having a robot do it is better than the human hand. I think
we all accept that. Where's your line on this and where do you feel where do you feel like you have to show some flexibility?
That's a great question. I don't think. I think people there's a perception out there when you speak against anything that has an effect on jobs, you have viewed as an impediment, right, and that impediment is what That impediment is the bottom line of a balance sheet and the profits of that company, int or technology. We do not want to be an impediment that is going to potentially maybe improve our members' jobs, improve productivity, improve work as safety.
We are going to embrace technology because we have for since nineteen oh three. I mean, think about think about what's behind me two horse heads and carriages. Right. What technology that we had to deal with was a combustible engine that came and created vehicles that we got off of horses and got behind staring wilds and trucks. Right, So we're not trying to be an impediment. We know what's coming the problem is it's a difference between implementation
¶ Technology is being adopted without input for labor
versus conversation and input. So, in other words, there seems to be a disconnect where hey, we're just going to implement this technology without any consideration of having a conversation to say, hey, look this is what we're thinking of doing. This potential could be the effect. What do you think about this technology? It would say, great, However, where can we create jobs? How is this going to affect workers?
Those conversations aren't happening. It's you know, we don't want to be an impediment, but we want to be part of the solution to a potential problem. As a result of it, we know it's coming. Just give us a seat at the table and hair our point of view. And like we're seeing the grocery warehouse industry, you know, there was a big push and there is a big push in these big grocery warehouses where we represent you know, thousands upon thousands of workers nationwide, the big grocery chains
where they did implement robots to select orders that did jobs. However, we created jobs as a result of it. Who's going to program these robots, who's going to maintain these robots, who's going to do quality control. So we were able to create jobs because we had those conversations, and we maintain the workforce. We do not want to be impediment
to anything that's going to potentially make life easier. But we can't embrace something where we don't have the knowledge and or a solution to the bigger problem, which where do you put these people to work.
Let's go back to the nineties and NAFTA and what
¶ What mistakes did labor make during NAFTA negotiations?
was in anticipation of what was going to be huge displacement, massive job shifting, outsourcing overseas. Some of it was just outsourcing from the north to the south, right to work states versus so called white to work states, et cetera. What were the mistakes that your predecessors in the labor leadership world made then that you don't want to repeat, Well, as we bring AI on board here.
Yeah, so again we took people for their word. I think back then, you know, think about it when when NAFTA came into effect, you know, Clinton introduced that. We were very supportive of Clinton in the ninety two election. All this isn't going to hurt, it's going to help. You know, There'll be a residual value as a result. Of these trade agreements, I think we trust Agay, you guys were the least.
If I remember, the Teamsters were the most supportive of NAFTA compared to the other unions, right.
Because it was well initially, yeah, initially we were very very well. After that, we were anything that was introduced. I think it was p and tr after that, Yeah, trying to trade Dale and I think KAFTA was after that. After getting burnt on NAFTA, you know, the skepticism was at an all time high. So I think to your question,
¶ Labor made a mistake trusting political leadership with NAFTA
what mistakes were made that I don't want to make that my predecess made. They trusted the people that we supported at that point in time, where I'm not suggest you shouldn't trust people. But just because someone has a d the name doesn't mean that making good policy behalf of American workers. And I don't think it was well thought out, uh and or explained. Well, maybe it wasn't explained to to with all the facts associated with it.
So that's why we're being different. We're different nowadays under our leadership because I'm having those conversations with both sides. If the Republicans introduce something that it's good for us I'm gonna go to the Democrats and say, all right, the Republicans are telling us that this this is good for our members. Is it good in your opinion?
Is it good?
And if it is, why is it? If it's not, why is it not? So I don't think any of those discussions happened, and I think people just back then, uh, you know, took people for their word. I mean, I just I'm not gonna do that, you know. I want to know exactly what the effects are going to be. And look, hopefully they're going to be honest and open with us. If look, if I'm gonna if I'm gonna take a hit, tell me I'm gonna take a hit. That way, I can be prepared to defend it, you know.
¶ Democrats used to be the party of labor, now also a party of business
But if you're going to be, you know, less than honorable in telling us the effects and or your intentions, then that's a problem for the people that tell us.
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¶ Labor needs to be transactional and not partisan
five two nine law on your cell phone. And remember all law firms are not the same. So check out Morgan and Morgan. Their fee is free unless they win. When we look at you, know you've pointed out how close an age we are. And in some ways, when you and I were growing up, Democrats were the party
of labor. Republicans were to party of business. As you and I became adults, the Democrats started to become basically the Clinton wing of the party became the party of business also, So then all of a sudden and there was this moment where it looked like labor was shrinking and shrinking and shrinking. Then then I think that the Great Recession sort of awoken to people, right, and suddenly there was people realized, oh, job protections, Maybe I can't
trust these entities. Where would you see? Was was the setup a mistake back when we were kids that labor shouldn't have been tied to one party and frankly business shouldn't have been tied to one party.
Yeah, I mean I think if we all had a duel of us, so to speak, no, we know now, I think most of us would adopt the philosophy that we're trying to adopt now. From my union, I can only speak for my union.
Being Teamster's transactional rather than D and R.
Right, yeah, right, It's just what's who is going to bet? Who is going to you know, make decisions that are going to support working people. I mean, that's it's It's not hard, it's pretty simple, and I think oftentimes we complicate too many things. But I think if we had a do over, it wouldn't be just you know, embracing one party versus the other. And conversely, you know, one
party shouldn't embrace big business versus working people either. I mean, I think both sides are guilty of that, right and who's paying the consequence as far right now, I mean, you think about these trade deals, these trade deals right now, if you go back and you look at footage of you know, and again I don't want to seem like
I'm picking on the guy Chuck Schumer. In nineteen ninety six, he's given a speech on the Senate floor, I believe, or maybe the House floor saying how bad the Chinadale is and how we need to these tariffs and all this other stuff. And then two thousand and seven, two thousand and eight, Hillary Clinton's you know, explaining to her policy and immigration. Now fast forward, you know, the same
¶ Republicans like Rubio have become more friendly to labor
positions that these folks were taking, you know, fifteen twenty years ago, is the same policy is basically implemented under this administration, although the immigration policy has been a little bit more aggressive than probably people thought, which you know, again that's another debate for another conversation, but it's like
contradicting it best. So for me and you, we've been fortunate enough to look at what the the argument was from the Dems then to what it is now, what the arguments from the Republicans were then, and where we are now. It's like it's so contradicting, Like who do you believe?
Well, that's quite curious, you know, I've watched Marco Rubio as a senator started to do this transition, right, the guy who ran in twenty ten, in twenty sixteen versus the guy you saw run for reelection in twenty twenty two. Do you believe him?
So?
I don't know him that well, okay, but if you.
Don't want to pay I'm not picking on him. He's an example of somebody that has shifted to being a bit more friendly to your positions. But the question is whether how do you get trusted? Is it just rhetorical?
¶ Has the Republican shift been rhetorical or substantive?
Is he only there for the voters? You know?
No, So I agree with you he has he has gotten a lot more sympathetic to our issues. I had a conversation with him, and again I met a lot of these folks at the r n c H when I went there, But I had a conversation about a month ago at the White House, and he probably didn't know me from a hole in the wall prior to the r n C. But he came right up to me and he gave me his whole history of his dad being a hotel worker, losing his job, they went on strike, and he said all the right things, and
he's like, look, I like I embraced unions. It helped me through my whole you know, childhood. We led a good middle class life. So he's saying all the right things, and the dealings that we've had to deal with them on he's been fair, you know. Now, whether that's you know, sincerity or politically motivated, the truth always comes out. I mean, so if you had to ask me out, how's Macromobile? Nice guy, great conversations with him, says all the right things.
When you what do you make of of of this shift in the Republican Party over the last ten years? Is it how much of it's been just rhetorical and how much of it have you actually seen in policy?
So I'll tell you I can probably go a little bit more. I can probably give a better better description over the last three and a half years and ten years because I come from Massachusetts, right and in Massachusetts, as you know, especially Boston, That's where I'm from.
You know, I never would I never would have guessed yeah, yeah, this southern accent.
And cowboy boots on two. But uh, you know, we never looked at it as Dems are Republicans because how I looked at it, and this philosophy is unqualified opinion. I always looked at people are only a certain party affiliation because of the zip code where they lived. Right, nine out of ten times. There was bipartisanship on many and most issues. So when I came to the SEE three and a half years ago, and we had a
lot of success working with the legislation. I did twenty years as a head of a local twenty five in Boston, the one of the biggest locals, and I had a great relationships with both Democrats and Republicans. We got a lot of good work down.
We've got autism autism legislation past mandating private insurance companies
¶ Josh Hawley was persuaded to stop supporting Right to Work
to provide services for families with autism.
We passed movie tax and centers into perpetuity. That's going to support an industry, and that was all bipartisan did a lot of great work, brought casinos to Boston. So when I came here. I'm like, you know, I'll take the JV and I don't mean that disrespectful, the junior varsity template, and we're going to bring into the varsity game.
And we started reaching out across the aisle, talking new people like our age demographic, jade, like Josh Hawley, jd Vance, Roger Marshall, a lot of folks that we had a lot in common with, may not agreed on everything. And that's how last three and a half years, I think the one thing that we've we've done well, which is
always room for employment, is reached across the island. Had conversations. So, for instance, Josh Howley, when I first met with him, we talked about a lot of issues, told him how many members we had in the state, and we said, you know, we don't support national right to work. We don't support right to work, and he said why I support right to work. I'm like, well, tell me why. And we had this conversation. I told him why we didn't, and we put out some you know, facts and figures.
¶ Bad trade deals caused Ohio to flip from blue to red
Do you know he flipped his narrative right away and said, you know, I no longer support right to work. This is not getting my constituents. So think about if we didn't have those conversations, and look, not all of them in the success story that you know, look.
I look holly to me, you know, I look I am not. I am more and more convinced that it doesn't matter who you elected, It matters what your incentives are.
Right, right.
He lives in a state. You just it's a union state. It's a conservative state culturally, right, but it's a union state, always has been, and which is why I think that whole you know, Missouri, the Democrats hung on longer there than because of the fight over right to work.
Now you look at you look at do you look at Ohio for instance?
Right?
That used to be completely blue, right right? Pretty much a lot of industry Ohio was crushed with these bad trade deals. I mean when you really think about it. So what we've focused on is and then this is
¶ No explanation for why Sean wasn't invited to the DNC
the example of you know, my unqualified opinion in the last three and a half years is you get Senator Bernie Marino, Republican. I mean, he's embracing, he's embracing, uh, you know, a lot of policies, pushing forward a lot of our agenda because he represents those people that were affected in Ohio and as a result, I mean he first hand witnessed, you know, the demonization of industry in Ohio as a result of these bad trade deals. He's
been another breath of fresh air. There were working with Senator Eustead as well, who came in, you know, filling Vice President Vance's seat, has also started to come to that philosophy. Plus it's an election, yeah.
Right, any space and a guy like Shared Brown, who I'm sure you do have a relationship with.
We do. And Sharon Brown wasn't happy that I went and spoke at the r n c R and I said, look, I would have gave that same speech had I been invited to the DNC. And you know, it's funny in politics. And you know, still.
Trying to understand why you weren't invited to the dancing. I don't know you have a good explanation.
I no, I wish I did. I wish I did. But you know, I listen, I tell people all the time when I at my age, when I don't get invited to weddings, I'm okay because I'll just send a check. I don't need to go.
But it's so funny, you say that right. You know, my wife and I joke about this all the time. You hit a certain age. First, you're younger, you're like, how come I didn't get invited to this? You're older, You're like, God, why did I get invited to this?
So I tell people all the time, Look, don't invite me.
¶ The Teamsters were never going to co-endorse Kamala Harris
I'm gonna send a check anyways, it's a fundraiser. Just don't invite me. Know that I'm thinking of you. I'll send the donation, right, But no, I mean it's our I mean, it's it's there. There's some good Republicans coming along that way having dialogue with now there's something that no matter what dialogue we have and or case we make, they're just rigid. They're rigid and not going to move. And that's okay too. But you know, I think the last three and a half years, the conversations UH have
been have been very positive. UH in continuing even if we agree to disagree on issues, my goal, and I think I think I would love it to be everybody's goal, especially now. I mean, this is such an awful, hostile, gross time in the United States when you fail to keep communicating regardlessl of talks are going good or bad. You're failing your job, You're failing your constituents.
What could Kamala Harris have done differently to earn a even co endorsement from you?
Not run for president? No, it was just never gonna Yeah, it's just it wasn't gonna happen for us. I'm members we we did some significant pulling. I'm not suggest I'm not getting personal, but uh, let me let me back up for a second. Joe Biden was was was great to unions as a president. I'm never going to take that away from him.
When he came, he was probably the most pro union president he was you have ever had, We've had since FDR.
There's no doubt. There was no doubt. And again, uh, you know, people always remind you of what they've done for you in the past, not what they're going to do for you in the future. And Joe Biden came and met with us, and I got to tell you, like, I felt bad. I really did, because you know, I was brought up to be always respectful of people that are older than your be just always respect the position,
respect the person. And you know, he lost his fastball and it was like, you know, part of it for me personally, was like, it just looks like someone's being propped up and then not looking out for his best interest, in looking out for their own personal interest. And then when you know, he dropped out of the race and
¶ Teamsters have 65% Republican membership
Kamala came in, it kind of gave the sense of it was like a birthright for her to be the candidate. And you know, that was a big, big mistake I think on the Democratic Party. This should have been a continguency plan two years prior to the election, and that wasn't there. And you know, you hear all these stories living in DC. You know that he was going to
be a transitional president. There was a meeting and you know, he got pushed back from a lot of staff people that whose jobs could have been in jeopardy, all this other stuff. I mean, I think, you know, hey, she ran for the president. She lost. You can't recreate history. But I don't think she was the best candidate. You know, if I really had to think about, there were a lot more candidates out there and it probably would have gave Trump a run for his money.
Would you describe your membership as pretty fifty to fifty.
No, sixty, It was sixty five thirty five when we did a polling, we did significant polling. We actually rump sixty five for Trump Republican. Yes, so we did so, I'll tell you it was interesting. We've never done this before as an organization. But you know, we're out in the field every single day and we're talking to our members social media. There's so much communication and some of it's not credible, but you could just see members gravitating
towards the Republicans. And I don't think it was just because it was Trump. I think it's just, you know, the Democrats weren't controlled the last sixteen out of twenty years, and what really have we got done? What really Democrats
¶ Labor is the last group taken care of during a bankruptcy
do for us? Under Obama we had a Democratic House, Senate, and president. And our biggest issue back then was the Employee Free Choice Act should have been a layout right, which was basically the pro Act right that didn't happen. And then under Biden this was.
The basically the ability to ask for collective bargaining right.
The ability of an employer to once there was a majority status, to recognize and sit down and bargain and you know, come to a collective bargain agreement. And it should have been a layup. But it again, that's part of the reason why our members started defecting. They was seeing time and time again that you know, the working people's agendas weren't being put forward. I mean, you think
about bankruptcy. Bankruptcy laws in this country are antiquated, and we deal with it all the time when companies go bankrupt.
This is an Elizabeth Warren obsession, right to the bankruptcy legislation right.
When companies go bankrupt, and we've seen it, you know, everybody gets this, right. We had a last line of creditors. Uh in the line they're not even treated as creditors. No, we're treated as qumodity commodity right, like we'll throw them three cents on the dollar and tell them that's not we can do. So, you know, the whole system has failed us. And even when there were times like under
strong democratic leadership, you know, our issues weren't taken in consideration. Now, one thing that Biden did unbelievable for us on is you know, funding these pension funds so that they didn't collapse. And I say that all the time, and that got thrown in my face when I spoke at the RNC right after it. You know a lot of Democrats, like
¶ Democrats don't deserve credit for fixing a problem they created
Sherrid Brown was not happy that I spoke there. He came to my office and he said, you know, I help with that legislation. Butch lewis no doubt you helped us with that legislation. We are grateful we got pensions. They're going to be solving till twenty fifty one. People aren't going to have to worry about. That was the right thing to do. However, who broke them? Who broke these pensions? What do you mean? And I had the
same conversation with a lot of other Democratic senators. I said, in nineteen eighty, Ted Kennery from Massachusetts pass legislation deregulation the trucking industry. The Teams to union lost four hundred thousand trucking jobs, and that deregulation started filtering into other industries. If you lose four hundred thousand jobs, that's four hundred thousand contributions times forty hours a week, times you know, fifty two weeks a year. That is a significant drain
on these funds. You know, each year it goes on. And then take into consideration a lot of these companies, good companies were forced into bankruptcy where none of these monies were captured because the bankruptcy laws did pax. And I said, look, I'm very grateful you fixed the problem that you helped create. And I use this analogy. I'm playing street arc in my neighborhood nineteen eighty' you know,
eight years old, right, I break my mother's window. Forty years later, I say, I'm going to fix that window. Should I look for accolades from my mother for fixing a problem that I helped create? And Joe Biden was the center. He signed off on the legislation of deregulation, and that was when Reagan was a president, who by the way, we endorsed Reagan as well. So it's you know.
Everybody lets you down on that one.
Yeah, yeah, But my point is, you know, once you took a position like we did, because the polling we did, and we did three intense poems, we did a straw pole in the Union Halls where we could have tipped it should have been tipped like eighty twenty to Biden, and it was like, you know, thirty five percent Biden, thirty percent Trump, and then independent factored in as well.
¶ What's the relationship like with other labor unions?
We're like, all right, this isn't a good gauge. So then we do a publication every month, every quarter, I believe every month it's one. It goes to one point six million people. And we got record participation with a with a code, a QR code, and Harris was in the race with Waltz at this point in time, and it went sixty five thirty five Republican, and like, all right,
let's do one more poll. So we utilize the impolster that the Harris Waltz campaign utilized and it was the same result as we got from the QR code of our members. So we were like, all right, we've got to represent sixty five percent of our members. We also have to represent the thirty five percent. You know, this is too close. We're gonna we're going to take a pass. We're going to not make an endorsement. Local unions, joint consuls, they're autonomous. You do what you want to do in this one.
And they kind of did, if I'm not mistakes, they did.
But you know, the majority of them, I mean, California was probably the most outgoing for Harris and Wallas, and there were some other uh maybe maybe Illinois, but most people, you know, chose to take a step back as well, because again, now members of their constituents.
What's your relationship these days with the rest of the labor movement, right, it's it's sometimes with the collective of the afl CIO and all of that. And they've been they've been back and forth overtime, and you know, to me, there's the Teamsters, then there's the afl CIO. Is that
¶ There is some ill-will from other unions for not endorsing Harris
that's still that's still the pecking order in your in your mind.
You're not a member of yeah c IO, right, yeah, well not a member of the fl CIO. I mean, they do good work, there's no doubt about it. We definitely represent different interests with our members versus you know there.
Why aren't you a part of a fl CIA.
You know what happened when probably about I think twenty years ago when you know, there was there was a riff between I think President trumpker at that point in time and some of the other labor unions I think the Laborers, the Compenters, the Teamsters, uh, and there are a couple other affiliates. I think s c IU formed their own change to Win coalition.
Well I remember that that really blew things up and with.
Drew withdrew UH the international unions, but you know, a lot of the affiliates and that was one of them. In Boston, we stayed. We stayed with the fl CIO locally for some time and that's still that's still the practice. That's the encouragement from us. We just you know, we do our own thing. We've got our own staff, we've got our owner ability to lobby, We've got our own ability. I mean there are times we work on projects together.
¶ An endorsement wouldn't move the needle with the members
I think, to your question, I'm gonna answer it honestly. I think, Uh, you know this this some ill will from other unions on us non endorsing UH Vice President Harris. But you know, at the end of the day, Chuck, I will help any union. I will help any affiliate, even if we do have a difference of opinions. But you know, there is I've heard some chatter now again when you see them, everybody is your best friend, right,
¶ How can Democrats win back union members?
but you know, you go online and you see everything. I don't take it personally, I get it. My whole focus and goal is I've got to serve the people that I'm elected to serve, and I got to make decisions and recommend decisions. H and the best interests in And you know, I believed at the time, and I still believe that we made the best decision possible. And look,
we're in a good spot. I mean, some of these unions that criticized me, uh with help broker meetings with with with the White House, you know, to you know, stop any kind of attack on a certain industry, or to help facilitate a relationship. So look, I'm sure there's some hurt feelings, but even if we did endorse in the selection, it wouldn't have moved the needle. You know, we did what was the best interesting. Look, we pulled our members, and you know, I think we made the right decision.
So if Andy Basheer, Wes Moore, I'll throw I'll throw a Gretchen Whitmer.
We forget, don't forget Josh Shapiro.
Josh Shapiro, the four of them come to you and say, what do I do to make sure I'm not at the thirty five of a sixty five thirty five split in twenty twenty eight.
I want to tell them, what do you tell them? Go out talk to your constituents, our members. Remember to member, have face to face conversations. Ask their opinions, don't dictate what they should.
Be doing for you.
You work for them. You need to win the trust back over.
I was part of the problem.
Give me an example of something. I mean, I've heard
¶ The split between members and leadership over supporting D's
a similar look. You know, there's sort of this stereotype of that I joke these days of Democrats and Republicans. Republicans go out of their way to agree with the voter. Democrats go out of their way to convince the voter that they're right, and it's it's sort of a you know which, which is actually a much harder thing to do.
I'm going to get your true testimonial.
Yeah.
I was speaking at an International Union's convention, uh probably about a month ago in Hawaii, and I was explaining just what I explained to you, the polling and everything else and after the whole and it was like in front of about five thousand people walking out, and a lady approaches me, and I can see it coming and you just see the body language. And she walked right up to me and pointed her finger and said, what are you doing to educate those sixty five percent of
the numbers? I said, I'm not doing anything to educate them. I said, what are the Democrats doing to find out why sixty sixty five percent of our members didn't support them. That's not up to me, that's up to the members. I said, that's the problem here. It's my job to educate someone who made a choice based upon you know, personal and or maybe validated concerns with the party. What do you want me to do? Is educating me telling what to do? Because that's not what we're going to do.
You know, it's interesting, It's a dilemma. I know some unions have a similar split, particularly the Trades, where a majority of their members are Trump, but the leadership all went to the Democrats, right, and they do try to quote educate their members. Look, we know you may not like these issues, but do you know Speaker Pelosi is what got this done and you may not like her, but here's why we're siding with her. Is that on a labor leader to explain or not?
Oh, you have to. I think you have to in that scenario. Like I've been critical of both Republican and Democrats, However I always acknowledge what they've done for us or haven't done for us. So you know, Chuck Schumer, you know reminds me every time he sees me that you know,
¶ How can you trust the Republicans?
he fixed our pensions. Well he didn't do it alone, right, And I'll tell people, Look, Joe Biden was the most pro union president. He actually signed the legislation I fixed out pensions, and then I'll give the story on why
these pensions were broke. Like I said to you, So, yeah, it is up to us to give the tale of the table on both sides as far as yeah, they did this over here, but I could also point to three or four different things that they haven't done either, Like I've had situations where saying, hey, you know, Josh Hally isn't for working people, or Roger Marshall's for working people. Oh really, I said, they signed on to support letters for our members, though we're potentially going to strike at ups.
They signed on to help our rail workers who didn't have a contract for four years. Yeah, although so and so a Democrat might have, you know, said, taken credit for something, they didn't sign onto this legislation, as signed on to the support of this legislation. They didn't sign on to support Amazon workers. So we can always point and I think to your point, Yeah, we're going to point out what people have done for us, but we're also going to point out what they haven't done for us.
We've spent a lot of time noting where Democrats have let you down. Why do you trust the these? Uh, the the your new allies, some of your new allies.
Listen, I'm a Democrat, always going to be a Democrat. I don't trust anybody. Okay, I want to see when people say something looking And I was brought up and you know, I was brought up by a very very strong Irish woman and my very strong Irish father who's no longer with us. But the one thing they always said, with all you have left in your life is your reputation and your work. And the Republicans have a great
¶ Teamsters will definitely weigh in on senate and house races in 2026
opportunity right now because the Democratic parties fraction. They're portraying themselves as wanting to be the party of working people, and the Democrats have to win the trust and support back of working people. And I'm leveraging both of those narratives. Hey, you said when you were running, you want to you want to you want to be the party working people. Well, why aren't you jumping on board support? And you know,
the Faster Labor Contracts Act as Republicans. Because we've got bipartisans support and growing in that, that's an opportunity for Republicans to actually say well or to demonstrate, hey, we do support we do support working people. And also if they do that, the Democrats going to come home and criticize that. No, they can't. But but if the Republicans say I'm not supporting it or we don't get Republican support, they're just allowing the Democrats to weaponize that issue. And
maybe that's the Maybe that's the UH strategy. I don't know.
Let me get you out of here. In two things one twenty twenty six is is this a low I saw for instance, in Michigan, various teamsters, you know, the state went one way, a couple of locals went another. Is that mostly how teamsters endorsements work into in a midterm year or will the National Will year office sort of way in uncertain Senate races, certain House races.
Yeah, we're going to We're going to weigh in on certain Senate races, especially the senators and House members that
¶ Teamsters would happily accept student athletes as union members
support us, whether you have a D n R or nine. You know, the beauty of the teams to's union. We have three hundred and nineteen local unions in thirty I believe thirty something, joint councils, regional councils. You know, everybody's
they like their pride of autonomy, and we give them that. However, if we are working on legislation like fastera Labor Contracts Act or warehouse protection, and we're getting support from from people that are currently in office that might have a dn R, we're gonna we're going to weigh in and say, look, this is what these people have done for us. But at the end of the day, it's usually left up to the local unions and the joint consuls.
I'm gonna paint a scenario for you. Uh, the athletes of the Big ten decide they're going to organize. I think it's coming, frankly, collective bargaining in college sports. There's a lot of money at state. There's frankly no protections for these athletes right now in various ways. Is do you do the teamsters want? You know, would would athletes who got a collective you know, we're able to sort of get a collective be recognized as a union. Would
you want them as Teamsters members? Or is that too far. Is that too far? There's no there's no union out there. Okay, well explain why, explain why teamsters, we'll be able to help the big ten football players.
I play college football one semester. Right. It's a full time job, a lot of demands. Uh, and there's no guarantees.
Right.
Do you want to go put sports aside? Do you want to go work for an employer whether there's a lot of demand and no return. No, you don't, so that that's right in our whalehouse. As far as repers, I will represent anybody you know we were accused of. If a fire hydrant wanted to negotiate a contract, the teams would represent them. Right, No, we would love to
¶ College football union membership would likely be by conference
because you don't think about it. You are don't you believe that's coming? I think it's coming. Look a good friend of mine, I know you're a you're a huge University of Miami. Gino Torrett is a very good friend
of mine. Oh you know he and our Yeah, way back when I mean he was saying, you know, this is a full time job, like it was forty plus hours per week, and the demands that are put on you, like you don't have you don't have the ability to say no to these college coaches or these even the administration. So it's like, you know, there's no rights of these call they owned you, and no one should be owned. No one should be mandated what to say and what
to do. And let's let's face it, I mean college sports, the NCAA, you know this nil money. I mean, I think you're one hundred percent right, it's coming and.
No, I mean, yeah, we just.
Don't want to be the union that represents them. You know, my son plays college hockey and you know, he's forty hours a week, you know, up in the morning training practice, and then classes are like you know, eight seven, eight o'clock at night. There's twelve thirteen hour days. But the majority of the time during the season is focused on the season.
Now, and with all this, I mean when you're talking multi billion dollar TV contracts now for these conferences. So I think the only way this works is if it's a players union by conference, but who knows, I mean yeah, or maybe it's by region or something like that. Yeah, it'd be nice if our conferences were by region, but you know.
Wouldn't it. Yeah, we got that maybe BC would be a competitor.
Were you a BC player? Where'd you play?
I went to the University of Mass Mass You Mass, Yeah, yeah.
Trying hard to be an FBS I love.
Oh yeah yeah. So I went to the U Mass Boston campus. I went to University of New Haven first and then went to you Mass. No.
Well, by the time this airs will know whether the Red Sox have beaten the Yankees or not.
But it's gonna be a tough one. Huh yeah, it's gonna be.
How great two of three between old rivals like this.
I mean, no matter what, we hate to see someone losing that in that situation, you know.
Get out of here. I got a Red Sox fan. What do you mean you hate to see someone lose?
Well, you do because I mean, look, they're playing that high n right. They hate each other.
Your your empathy, You're filled with empathy. Where's the where's the Boston hate? Man?
Listen, Let's talk hockey. Let's talk football like there's no other team than Boston Bruins and the New England Patriots.
You know, So that's where you that's that's where they come at.
Yeah. Baseball's baseball, you know, Baseball great American sport. We used to say my neighbor. But yeah, the kids that can't skate end up playing baseball. Oh wow, I know exactly where you grew up.
Hey, shot up bright. This is great man. I appreciate you.
Appreciate you, my friend. This is all right,