#CWA AFA President Sara Nelson

[partisan-by-default]

Flight Attendants at Frontier Airlines, represented by the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA), voted 99.6% to authorize a strike with 92.7% participating. The results come as management refuses to negotiate over the impact of the carrier’s business model change. Frontier management has a legal obligation to bargain over that impact, separate and distinct from their obligation to engage in regular contract negotiations, yet they continue to refuse to bargain or even engage in mediation through the National Mediation Board.

“Frontier Flight Attendants are struggling to earn a living because of management’s new ‘out-and-back’ model. The impact of this change has turned our lives and our paychecks upside down,” said Jennifer Sala, AFA Frontier President. “The harm is real and happening right now. We’re ready to do whatever it takes to bring management to the table.”

Just last week Frontier Airlines CEO Barry Biffle boasted that their operational changes have resulted in “real” cost savings, adding that the airline is “saving a significant amount.” Those savings are partially being paid for by Flight Attendants, and the impact of that must be addressed by management and corrected immediately.

“Frontier management is putting their ‘cost savings’ plan on Flight Attendants’ backs. It’s a gross example of corporate greed that devalues the contributions of these Flight Attendants to the airline and creates incredible instability for the people who make Frontier fly,” said Sara Nelson, AFA International President. “Frontier must negotiate to reflect the impact of their completely new business model.”

[creeping-shadow-heralds-storms]

The head of the nation's largest flight attendant union says Wednesday's riot at the Capitol "disqualif[ies] these individuals from the freedom of flight.”

Thousands of Trump supporters traveled to D.C. ahead of Wednesday’s riot at the Capitol, making flying a nightmare for other passengers and especially those who planned to cast a Senate vote to confirm President-elect Joe Biden’s victory. The head of the country’s largest union of flight attendants doesn’t think the supporters who rioted should get another chance.

Sara Nelson, the international president of the Association of Flight Attendants-Communications Workers of America (AFA-CWA) and one of the country’s most visible labor leaders, released a statement Wednesday night denouncing the mob takeover of the Capitol and referencing the disruptive flights from the days leading up to it. 

“The mob-mentality behavior that took place on several flights to the D.C. area yesterday was unacceptable and threatened the safety and security of every single person onboard,” Nelson said. “It will not happen again.”

Nelson continued: “Some of the people who traveled in our planes yesterday participated in the insurrection at the Capitol today. Their violent and seditious actions at the Capitol today create further concern about their departure from the D.C. area. Acts against our democracy, our government, and the freedom we claim as Americans must disqualify these individuals from the freedom of flight.”

Nelson went on to say that airlines as well as federal law enforcement and agencies dealing with aviation “must take all steps to ensure the safety and security of passengers and crew by keeping all problems on the ground.”

The AFA-CWA represents nearly 50,000 flight attendants who work for 17 different airlines, including United, Delta, and Frontier. The Association of Professional Flight Attendants (APFA), which represents 28,000 flight attendants at American Airlines, did not immediately respond to a request for comment asking if they supported the request. 

In a statement to VICE News, Delta Airlines spokesperson Morgan Durrant didn’t directly address Nelson’s request, but said “there’s nothing more important than protecting the integrity of the safety and security measures that keep our employees and customers safe.”

“While that means refraining from discussing specifics, we can say Delta continually works with law enforcement agencies and all aviation stakeholders to enact methods - both seen and unseen - as part of our unwavering efforts to keep everyone safe at our airports and on our flights.”

Fifty-two people were arrested during yesterday’s riot, but hundreds more stormed the Capitol as a Congressional session to affirm President-elect Joe Biden’s election victory was delayed for several hours. Four people died, including one woman who was shot and killed by Capitol Police.

On Tuesday, Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, a Republican who supported Biden’s certification and harshly criticized the president on the Senate floor when the session resumed, was heckled by Trump supporters both at the Salt Lake City International Airport and on his flight to D.C. for not supporting Trump’s bid to overturn the election results. 

[antoine-roquentin]

Sara Nelson, the president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA union (AFA-CWA) and an emerging force in an energized labor movement, had the foot soldiers of the left’s budding “political revolution” in tears.

She was speaking at the Democratic Socialists of America’s biennial convention in Atlanta last month and began with a story from the early history of American workers’ rights....

Earlier this year, staring down the longest government shutdown in US history, Nelson gained national attention when she called for a general strike as a way of pressuring Donald Trump and Congress to act. The idea was radical – and supporters say it set in motion a series of events that brought the weeks-long shutdown to an end.

“People think power is a limited resource,” she said in Atlanta. “But using power builds power.”

Nelson has struck a chord with progressives and grassroots activists who have amplified calls for her to run for labor’s top job: president of the nation’s largest federation of unions, the 12.5 million-member AFL-CIO.

“She knows how to excite people and how to give them the sense that a lot more is possible,” said Larry Cohen, a former president of the Communications Workers of America, of which AFA is an affiliate.

The unofficial race to succeed Richard Trumka as president of AFL-CIO is taking place mostly behind the scenes at this stage. But the longtime labor journalist Steven Greenhouse reported that Nelson and Liz Shuler, the AFL-CIO secretary-treasurer, are already vying for the role....

For Nelson, the next step is to build alliances. In May, she joined the United Mine Workers of America at a rally on Capitol Hill to urge Congress to pass legislation to protect coalminers’ pensions.

The spectacle of flight attendants in their pressed uniforms and knotted neck scarves standing in solidarity with miners wearing camouflage print union shirts was “fairly unusual”, conceded Cecil Roberts, president of the United Mine Workers. But this is what Nelson says she means when she talks about worker “solidarity”.

As the head of the AFA, she has worked to forge relationships with labor groups in other industries. Nelson argues that if workers join forces over wages and working conditions, they are less likely to be swayed by Trump’s efforts to divide them by race, culture and identity.

“No one is born with sexism, racism, ageism in their heart,” Nelson said in her Atlanta speech. “These are the tactics of the boss, of those who want all the money and all the power to deny us solidarity, the greatest force for good. Expose it. Call it out. Deal with it. And in our unions and on our picket lines we can do exactly that.”

As the head of a union that represents 50,000 flight attendants at 20 airlines, Nelson has been a part of some of the biggest cultural movements and political fights. In the wake of #MeToo, she testified to Congress that roughly three in four flight attendants experienced sexual harassment during their flying career. Leaders of an industry that once imposed age and weight restrictions on flight attendants must do more to combat sexual harassment in the workplace, she told lawmakers.

Earlier this year, her union sprang to action with a petition and media campaign to release a flight attendant who was detained for weeks by immigration officials in Texas after working a flight to Mexico because of her status under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca) program. And Nelson has also been a vocal critic of Boeing in the wake of two 737 Max jet crashes, that killed hundreds of people and led to the plane’s grounding. In June, she told a congressional panel that her union had noticed a “chastened tone” from the company.

“What Sara Nelson offers is a different kind of labor movement,” said Erik Loomis, a labor historian at the University of Rhode Island and the author of A History of America in 10 Strikes. “One that is, for the first time in a long time, charismatic and inspiring and one that speaks not only to current labor union members but also to the vast majority of the American working class that doesn’t belong to a union, or can’t have a union, or where it’s really difficult to form a union.”

Nelson’s embrace of militant tactics – and her reputation as a fierce negotiator – has drawn comparisons to the tough-talking, cigar-smoking union bosses of labor’s golden era. But today’s labor leaders, facing entrenched opposition to organizing and collective bargaining, have been forced to find creative ways to build power in a hostile legal environment.

“Nelson knows her history. She knows that unions and working people build power without having the law on their side and without accommodating or bowing to the interest of companies,” said Rebecca Givan, a professor of labor studies and employment relations at Rutgers University. “But clearly she believes there is value in reviving some of those strategies.”...

Nelson is a vocal supporter of a Medicare for All single-payer healthcare system. She argues that contract negotiations are increasingly consumed by fights over coverage and benefits, and believes that if the issue were moved “off the table” unions could spend more time fighting for wage increases and better working conditions.

But some leaders have raised concerns that a single-payer system, championed by the progressive presidential hopefuls Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, could negatively affect the benefits they have already painstakingly negotiated. One of the loudest opponents of Medicare for All has been the International Association of Fire Fighters, which endorsed former vice-president Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination.

Harold Schaitberger, the union’s president, says his union’s healthcare plan is designed to meet the unique and specific healthcare needs of firefighters that a Medicare plan is unlikely to provide.

[berniesrevolution]

IN THESE TIMES

Despite widespread support for the Green New Deal, an ambitious resolution to transform the economy and society to address the climate crisis, the labor movement is not uniting behind it. On March 8, the AFLCIO’s Energy Committee released an open letter to Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) criticizing the plan on grounds it “could cause immediate harm to millions of our members and their families.”

In contrast, some union locals have come out in support of the resolution, including the San Diego and Imperial Counties Labor Council, which noted in January that “climate change poses an immediate and long-term threat to all working people.” Groups like Climate Workers, a membership organization of rank-and-file workers, the Labor Network for Sustainability, a labor group that fights for ecological and economic justice, and the BlueGreen Alliance, a coalition of major unions and environmental groups, have spent years trying to bridge the labor movement and the movement for climate justice, but rifts remain.

The labor movement is divided precisely at a moment when it could ensure the passage of a Green New Deal rooted in justice, self-determination and union rights. The resolution’s call for a just transition emerges from the environmental justice, labor and Indigenous rights movements of the 1980s and 1990s. It is premised on the principle that the shift away from a fossil fuel economy must ensure workers play a lead role in the transition—and that workers are not abandoned in the shift to zero emissions. A jobs guarantee, universal basic income and protection of union rights—all floated as components of a Green New Deal—could play key roles.

In These Times called Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-Communications Workers of America (AFACWA) and a rising star among union leaders, to discuss the idea.

Nelson captured national attention when she issued a strike threat in the midst of the Trump administration’s infamous government shutdown over border wall funding. Five days later, when some air traffic controllers on the East Coast did not show up for work, she told New York magazine that flight attendants were “mobilizing immediately” to strike. Hours later, Trump announced he’d reached a deal to temporarily reopen the government.

Nelson’s very public challenge has made her a leading contender to replace Richard Trumka as president of the AFL-CIO if he retires as expected, at the end of his term, in two years.

Nelson was born in Corvallis, Ore., to a teacher and a lumber mill worker. She majored in English and education, and applied for a flight attendant position in 1996 to pay the bills. She recalled to the New York Times that her six-week training included “make-up” day for women to learn how to apply mascara while men took the day off. An early pay dispute turned her into a union activist, and she became the union’s president in 2014. One of the few international union presidents who publicly aligns herself with Bernie Sanders, Nelson now works about one flight a year, devoting the rest of her time to her union.

Nelson hails from an industry that poses a problem to the goal of zero emissions: Passenger airplanes account for 1–2% of global carbon emissions, and air travel is expected to double in the next 20 years. Finding alternative energy sources for airplanes has proven trickier than for cars or electrical grids. At the same time, Nelson represents workers whose conditions have already grown more dangerous as the climate crisis has escalated. “Extreme weather is increasing instances of turbulence, which is a serious occupational injury threat,” Nelson notes.

The Green New Deal calls for us to “achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions through a fair and just transition for all communities and workers.” As a labor publication that cares a lot about climate change, we have been asking ourselves what a “just transition” could actually be. What do you think?

Sara Nelson:

I can tell you what it’s not! A few hours of training is not a just transition. The transition needs to begin before the jobs go away. A just transition must ensure pensions and healthcare are protected for workers who spent their lives powering our country in the fossil fuel industries. A just transition includes bringing the expertise of unions to the table so we don’t create policy that has unintended consequences, such as making it impossible to produce steel needed to create alternative forms of energy. A just transition must also invest in technological innovation to determine whether current energy sources can be utilized in a green way. A just transition includes focus on negotiating fair trade agreements for American workers to keep production in the United States so that, for example, American workers are building wind turbines and solar panels. And finally, a just transition means maintaining income for families who depend on an actual transition of jobs, career training, apprenticeships.

What would it take to build more labor movement support for the Green New Deal?

Sara Nelson: 

Make labor central to the discussion, including labor rights, labor protections and labor expertise. We must recognize that labor unions were among the first to fight for the environment because it was our workspaces that had pollutants, our communities that industry polluted. Let’s not dismiss the labor movement. Let’s recognize and engage the infrastructure and experience of the labor movement to make this work.

We need the airline industry to engage as well. According to an industry analysis, the airline industry has, for the last 40 years, improved fuel efficiency at a rate equivalent to taking 25 million cars off the road each of those years.

The point here is that we need to build a broad coalition, and to do that we can’t start from a position that assumes opposition. If we bring everyone to the table, recognize the efforts to date, draw on the expertise from each affected field, and mobilize a united effort, then we can create allies where we otherwise might have had enemies.

Is increasing fuel efficiency enough? Because of more flights, total airline emissions are still expected to rise. Must flights decrease, and if so, how do we protect workers?

Sara Nelson: 

I think … [laughs] I think that we have to be pretty clear that interstate commerce in the United States, international trade and transportation just don’t work without air travel, right? We can advance technology to help the airlines use an alternative energy source and there is both a moral and a cost incentive to do that.

What are the biggest lies opponents of the Green New Deal tell workers?

Sara Nelson: 

The biggest lie is that the Green New Deal resolution is legislative policy and that it imposes certain strict requirements—for example with air travel, that every plane will stay on the ground in 10 years. There is not a flight attendant or pilot or anyone in aviation who actually believes that aviation is going to be grounded. That’s simply not true. The opposite is true. This resolution seeks to promote technological advancements and policies that will keep flights in the air. Today, airplanes are grounded because of severe weather events, sometimes for long periods because these events destroy infrastructure that is necessary to take off and land. Or, destroy the demand for those locations—there is nothing to fly to.

How can climate campaigners build bridges with organized labor?

Sara Nelson: 

First and foremost, there has to be a recognition that labor has never seen an actual “just transition.” You can say those words all day long, but what people hear is “a couple hours of training and then you’re going to leave my community devastated and alone—like a ghost town.” So, there’s zero trust.

If you want to build trust, you need to do two things. One, you need to shore up the wasteland that’s already been created where there was no just transition. When new environmental regulations promoted low-sulfur mining, collection of coal moved from union mines in Appalachia to nonunion surface mines out West. No one addressed the communities that were hurt in the process. So miners are understandably skeptical.

Now coal companies have filed for bankruptcy and stopped contributing to healthcare and pension funds. We need to push to adopt legislation that keeps America’s promise to coal miners of pensions and healthcare, as well as addresses black lung— that’s the bare minimum to show good faith that this process of taking on climate change will focus on making coal miners’ lives better, not worse. Bipartisan legislation to fund pensions has had support for years, but Mitch McConnell has stopped it from getting to a vote. We can demand H.R. 934/935 and S. 27 get passed now, and show miners and others working in the fossil fuel industry that we’re on their side. My union, AFA-CWA, will be on the Hill with the United Mineworkers of America on May 8 to do just that. Everyone should get behind securing those pensions.

Second, a just transition needs to talk about how we start the transition process early. We need to get into these communities, talk with them about their needs, and get to know them. It’s important that we not write them off and say, “They just have to get over it.” Nobody is ever going to get over not being able to provide healthcare for their families and watching people die in poverty or lose their homes. So, let’s talk with the people about the jobs that are there and what those jobs also support in the community. Every good union coal mining job supports another five jobs in that community. So, we need to start talking about how we are going to put some of these jobs back into those communities. With new technology? With training? And how are we going to support people in the meantime? Who is going to be able to get retrained and learn a new career?

(Continue Reading)

[slabotochnik]

WW 2-5-19 AFA Pres General Strike Call, Chicago Bus Drivers Weather and Mexican Labor Strike Wave by WorkWeek Radio WW 2-5-19 CWA AFA Pres General Strike Call, Chicago Bus Drivers Weather Danger and Mexican Labor Strike Wave https://ift.tt/2VnVBbo WorkWeek interviews Sara Nelson who is the president of the CWA Airline Flight Attendants. She represents over 50,000 flight attendants and talks about why she called for a general strike at a commemoration on MLK day. She discusses the conditions that airline workers and other working people are facing. Nelson also calls for rallies throughout the country on February 16, 2019 when President Trump has threatened to shut down the government again. Next WorkWeek hears about the dire dangers to bus drivers in Chicago and the public because of the dangerous weather conditions. We talk with Erek Slater who is a driver at Chicago MTA and is on the executive board of ATU Local 241 about these conditions and the need to protect workers and the public. Last WorkWeek looks at the growing mass strike rebellion in Montamoros, Mexico where over 70,000 factory workers have struck for living wages and decent working conditions. They have been joined by workers throughout the country. We talk with Al Rojas who is a founder of the UFWA and also with the Labor Council For Latin America in Sacramento. We also interview Alan Benjamin who is a delegate to the San Francisco Labor Council and was recently with a labor delegation from the San Francisco Labor Council that went to Mexico city for the inauguration of Lopez Obrador. Additional media: https://ift.tt/2ExjUhj In new government shutdown, flight attendants won't let passengers' lives be put at risk https://ift.tt/2Vh1nv6 WW1-2-19 The Fed Shutdown And Air Traffic Controllers NATCA Speaks Out https://ift.tt/2ExvNny https://ift.tt/2VklxED https://ift.tt/2ExjWFX https://ift.tt/2Vfme26 https://ift.tt/2ExjXtv https://ift.tt/2VmA2rz https://ift.tt/1rrJacE Production of KPFA WorkWeek Radio workweek@kpfa.org https://ift.tt/1rrJacE

[thesexypolitico]

Women Leading the Labor Movement: Sara Nelson

Women Leading the Labor Movement: Sara Nelson

Sara Nelson has served as the International President of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, AFL-CIO since 2014. The AFA represents fifty thousand flight attendants, about half the industry’s flight attendants. In 2001, Nelson was the vice-president of her local AFA council. Early in her career, Nelson had worked on United Flight 175, the flight that was hijacked and hit the south tower of…

[flyingbizdeals]

Airline union boss calls federal coronavirus response 'the strangest thing that I have ever experienced'

Airline union boss calls federal coronavirus response ‘the strangest thing that I have ever experienced’

The U.S. response to the coronavirus pandemic has led to domestic travel confusion and countries across the world limiting American tourists.

“This has been the strangest thing that I have ever experienced in my 25 years on the job,” Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA), said on Yahoo Finance’s The Final Round (video above). “I have never seen before that an…

[jobsearchtips02]

Coronavirus: Passengers go back to crowded flights without masks

The increase is little compared to regular traveler levels, but with airlines cutting capacity due to the coronavirus pandemic, a continued increase in guests could suggest more crowded flights

Crowding produces a challenging situation for airlines, which require to ensure their larger client base that air travel is safe in order to recover from the worst monetary crisis the industry has actually ever dealt with Choices consist of taking actions to encourage social distancing or requiring face masks, among other alternatives.

The number of Americans boarding commercial flights has actually increased progressively over the previous five days, leading to an increase in reports of crowded flights on which social-distancing measures were impossible.

Airlines around the world have significantly reduced their capability over the past 2 months as the coronavirus pandemic has actually led to plunging travel need. Many have suspended paths, canceled flights or frequencies, and grounded big portions of their fleets.

Demand stays low, including for future travel– airlines have reported practically zero inbound earnings, which has actually led to flights running just 5%to 10%complete.

On an American Airlines flight last week from Miami to New York’s LaGuardia, which was 80%to 90%full, according to a passenger on board, only about half of the passengers used masks.

Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, which represents flight attendants at about 20 airline companies, stated that the very same thing has happened on various flights over the previous week.

Nelson published a picture of a flight this weekend on Twitter, which showed a plane crowded with travelers not using masks. Nelson and the AFA have actually required the Department of Transportation to require guests to use face coverings, and to forbid non-essential travel till the spread of the virus can be included.

Although numerous airlines have measures in location to help with social distancing, it was not clear how sustainable or efficient they would be.

Loading Something is filling.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Avoidance, wearing masks or other face coverings may help prevent carriers of the virus from spreading it to others in close distance, but maintaining a minimum of six feet of range in between people is more effective.

Canada has actually required airline company passengers and teams to wear face coverings in airports and on planes, but the US does not have comparable guidelines, and numerous of the anecdotes in recent days recommend that social-distancing practices are not always being facilitated or followed.

If airline companies put “tough blocks” on middle seats when demand consistently picks back up, it will efficiently eat into the margins they earn on each flight, indicating they’ll lose money on some flights unless they raise fares for the remaining seats to make up for the loss.

Although American Airlines also blocks some seats on flights, consisting of middle seats and those surrounding to flight-attendant jump seats, the airline will assign those seats if the flight is nearing capacity, rather than bumping guests, according to an internal file seen by Service Insider.

” Last month, in reaction to CDC social distancing standards, American started briefly unwinded seating policies for clients on our flights and lowered onboard food and beverage service levels,” the spokesperson said.

” American now likewise blocks 50%of basic middle seats and all seats surrounding to Flight Attendant jump seats on every flight throughout our system,” the spokesperson included.

United, on the other hand is blocking travelers from choosing certain seats to avoid people sitting directly next to each other– nevertheless, the airline will still appoint those seats if a flight is relatively complete.

Southwest, which does not assign seats on its flights, stated that flight attendants were encouraging guests to choose seats spaced away from each other when possible.

%%.

from Job Search Tips https://jobsearchtips.net/coronavirus-passengers-go-back-to-crowded-flights-without-masks/

[tattooed-alchemist]

On Monday, January 13, we’ll have the swearing-in ceremony to my third term as a socialist City Councilmember. I’m honored that I’ll be sworn in by the dynamic and fearless Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA). And right after the swearing in, we will launch our 2020 Tax Amazon campaign!

January 13

6:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Washington Hall 153-14th Avenue Seattle, 98122 

[7newx1]

Donald Trump's record-setting partial shutdown of the U.S. government -- which kept roughly 800,000 federal workers unpaid for more than a month -- is finally over. Don't forget to thank your flight attendants. In the end, no one person or group is solely responsible for making Trump back off the U.S.-Mexico border wall demand that left portions of American society crippled for more than a month. But on the shutdown's 35th day, hours before it finally ended, headlines were dominated by news of disrupted travel plans. SEE ALSO: Cardi B speaks out on government shutdown Air travel was one of the many categories of American life impacted by the shutdown. Air traffic controllers are federal workers, and as safety professionals, their work is deemed essential. So they were still putting in their usual hours, but they were doing it without pay. Flight attendants work for private interests -- they're airline employees -- but they're also the ones who are most at risk as the infrastructure responsible for keeping planes in the air breaks down. There are Federal Aviation Administration rules requiring flight attendants to be present on planes of a certain size. In other words: flight attendants may not have been furloughed, but they had what could accurately be described as a vested interest in easing the strain the shutdown placed on air traffic controllers. The quiet finally broke on Friday. Faced with growing reports of air travel interruptions, representatives from the flight attendant and air traffic controller unions sounded an urgent alarm: fix this immediately or planes are going to start crashing. > Air traffic controllers "are making mistakes that they hadn't made in the 10, 15, 20 years .... They're making them because they're stressed out, because they don't know when this [shutdown] is going to end." > > --Trish Gilbert, National Air Traffic Controllers Assoc. > Via PBS pic.twitter.com/aIBN89GVWo > > -- Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) January 25, 2019 > Critical Update on Shutdown: Flight disruptions are starting. The system is unraveling as we had predicted. Watch this update and then get to your nearest congressional office to demand lawmakers open the government. https://t.co/fhLoiLnmfe #EndTheShutdown #StoptheShutdown pic.twitter.com/BBM9pynpcQ > > -- AFA-CWA (@afa_cwa) January 25, 2019 Hours later, the shutdown was over. It wasn't some bargaining breakthrough brokered by President Trump's fabled acumen as a deal-maker. Rather, it was the country's month-long transformation into trembling, overstuffed pressure cooker.  As many observers pointed out in the hours that followed, the final straw broke across the back of angry, exhausted aviation workers. > Here is the flight attendants' statement today. It is literally the only thing that matters. If you're crediting some rich plutocrat who derides "the lefties" for this shutdown ending, you're doing political analysis wrong.https://t.co/kG43aFdiIT > > -- Heidi N. Moore (@moorehn) January 26, 2019 > I am so proud of the air traffic controllers, flight attendants, & workers who, through their organizing, should be credited for their role in ending the shutdown. > > Dems only have the House (for now), so we must rely on the bravery + organizing of everyday people to push change. https://t.co/4vFzvZ1PrM > > -- Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 26, 2019 > Dems were glad to watch Trump's approval rating tank over these last weeks. Trump is not opening gov bc of Pelosi or Stone's arrest. He's opening gov because WORKERS shutdown a major US airport. Air traffic controllers, flight attendants & other WORKERS won this fight. https://t.co/f521EMFj4s > > -- Anya Parampil (@anyaparampil) January 26, 2019 > The temporary end of the shutdown isn't a victory for Nancy Pelosi or any other Democratic elected official. It's a victory for the airport workers who called in sick and threatened to go on strike. They raised the specter of airline chaos and forced Trump's hand. > > -- Micah Uetricht (@micahuetricht) January 25, 2019 > Anyway, as a footnote to this particularly miserable chapter of American history, it seems like the union closest to taking things to the next level to stop the shutdown was the Association of Flight Attendants: https://t.co/bxNqwhI9H9 > > -- Matt Pearce (@mattdpearce) January 25, 2019 > Relieved about the end of the shutdown today? > THANK A #UNION > Specifically: > Thank the @afa_cwa > Prez @FlyingWithSara > for mobilizing the #flightattendant force & declaring SAFETY as the urgent drive for #solidarity.https://t.co/pT35FH3yY9 > > -- Michael DeVito Jr. (@mdevitojr) January 25, 2019 > Trump couldn't take another night of air traffic controllers, pilots, flight attendants on TV saying flying isn't safe because of the Trump shutdown. https://t.co/iBHTB1Z0xb > > -- Lawrence O'Donnell (@Lawrence) January 25, 2019 Here's a final word from Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA and absolute boss of this moment. > .@lucymcbath, Flight Attendants Rock. That is all. > > -- Sara Nelson (@FlyingWithSara) January 26, 2019 UPDATED Jan. 26, 2019, 12:31 p.m. ET: An earlier version of this story incorrectly identified flight attendants as federal workers. Flight attendants work for the airlines, and their shutdown frustrations stem from a declining sense of safety as air traffic controllers increasingly felt the strain of absent paychecks. We apologize for the error, and have updated this story to make the distinction clearer. ## WATCH: This artist built an entire model plane out of nothing but manila envelopes

[berniesrevolution]

THE NEW REPUBLIC

The most powerful labor leader in the country right now is about 5’5” in sneakers, though her work uniform generally adds an extra inch or two. As the president of the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA-CWA) and veteran flight attendant who has worked for United Airlines since 1996, Sara Nelson is no stranger to wearing heels—but after spending some time with her, one gets the distinct impression that she’d be just as comfortable in combat boots.

Nelson has fast become a rising star in the labor movement, as well as one of its most unapologetically militant voices. As the head of a union that represents nearly 50,000 flight attendants at 20 airlines, she reacted to the government shutdown in January with dire concern for both her membership and the passengers they are charged to protect, and—unlike many of her peers in union leadership—decided to do something drastic to fix it. It was her call for a general strike, delivered during her acceptance speech for the 2019 AFL-CIO MLK Drum Major for Justice Award on Sunday, January 20, that was widely credited for jump-starting the endgame of President Donald Trump’s brutal five-week shutdown. When I met with her not long after the shutdown had concluded, she explained that she was moved to action in part because she found the government’s refusal to take care of back pay for the federal workers to be simply “wrong, completely immoral.”

It’s been a good while since American labor leaders—known mostly these days for resisting confrontational strike tactics and seeking to influence electoral outcomes via campaign donations—have resorted to such “which side are you on” appeals. But for Nelson, they’re her rhetorical stock in trade. During the shutdown crisis, she warned that the aviation industry had only a few more days before it began to truly collapse, and would soon face a massive wave of flight cancellations. Millions of air passengers would be put at risk thanks to the industry’s reliance on a grossly understaffed, unpaid federal security workforce, she prophesied. She went on to paint a dystopian picture of abandoned airline infrastructure not unlike what readers had encountered in the blockbuster line of Left Behind novels by Jerry Jenkins and Tim LaHaye: security checkpoints closed, safety inspectors absent, federal cybersecurity staff on furlough, and airport security personnel forced to work without pay. “As I have said many times in recent days, safety and security is non-negotiable,” she said at the AFL-CIO event. “The TSA was created for the same reason my friends’ names, along with 3000 others, are engraved in bronze at the 9/11 memorial in New York. If they can’t do their job, I can’t do mine. Dr. King said, ‘Their destiny is tied up with our destiny. We cannot walk alone.’ ”

Nelson was the first labor leader to dare utter the phrase “general strike” publicly—and to urge other AFL-CIO leaders to talk to their memberships about taking mass action. “Go back with the fierce urgency of now to talk with your locals and international unions about all workers joining together,” the call rang out from the blonde woman commanding the podium, “to end this shutdown with a general strike!”

Nelson was the first labor leader to dare utter the phrase “general strike” publicly—and to urge other AFL-CIO leaders to talk to their memberships about taking mass action.

That speech had an almost immediate real-world effect, as the substance of Nelson’s warning began to unfold in real time. Two days after her January 20 call to action, workers at several major Northeastern airports began calling in sick, causing major flight delays at Newark, Philadelphia, and New York City’s LaGuardia, as well as in Jacksonville, Florida, and Hartsfield-Jackson in Atlanta. Individuals had been doing this sporadically since as early as January 4, but once Nelson’s words rang out, the trickle became a flood. According to TSA national statistics, on January 21, the day after her speech, the unscheduled absence rate in the agency’s workforce was 7.5 percent, more than double what it had been on the same date a year previously. By January 21, 10 percent of TSA workers were calling in sick. On Wednesday January 23, the AFA-CWA, the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, and the Air Line Pilots Association International issued a joint letter stressing the urgent safety concerns associated with the ongoing shutdown, condemning the circumstances that forced their members to work without pay, and calling on Congress to take action immediately.

By January 25, the end of that workweek, air traffic controllers began an informal sick-out in protest of their second missed paycheck, which resulted in more flight delays at several high-traffic airports. Nelson recorded a message to her membership saying, “We have hit the breaking point,” and urged them to flood the phone lines of their congressional representatives. The AFA was mobilizing, very publicly, and with a deliberate agenda in view. That same day, Nelson released a statement emphasizing the human and economic impact of the shutdown and pointing toward the workers who’d been staging the mass sick-out. “Do we have your attention, Congress?” she pleaded.

They did.

A few hours later, the shutdown was over; Trump abruptly agreed to reopen the government, via an interim funding accord extending to February 15. (A threatened follow-up shutdown over wall funding for that date never materialized, no doubt because Republican pollsters and strategists were finally able to pull Trump away from such futile brinksmanship.) With a GOP leadership in Congress continuing to cravenly do Trump’s bidding at every turn, Nelson moved into the gaping power vacuum in Washington to serve as the efficient cause of the shutdown’s demise. “There was growing frustration among workers and among many people in the labor movement about the fact that as the shutdown dragged on, there wasn’t a stronger voice of condemnation out there,” says Joseph McCartin, a Georgetown University labor historian who’s specialized in the aviation industry. “What was missing was a voice of anger about the fact that these workers were being expected to continue to report to work even as they were not being paid, and that’s what Sara was able to give voice to. I think by doing that she played a really important role … and the fact that she was speaking out so openly helped push things to a conclusion.”

(Continue Reading)

[beautytipsfor]

As the Trump shutdown ends, cheers for air travel workers echo across Twitter

Donald Trump's record-setting partial shutdown of the U.S. government -- which kept roughly 800,000 federal workers unpaid for more than a month -- is finally over. Don't forget to thank your flight attendants. In the end, no one person or group is solely responsible for making Trump back off the U.S.-Mexico border wall demand that left portions of American society crippled for more than a month. But on the shutdown's 35th day, hours before it finally ended, headlines were dominated by news of disrupted travel plans. SEE ALSO: Cardi B speaks out on government shutdown Air travel was one of the many categories of American life impacted by the shutdown. Air traffic controllers are federal workers, and as safety professionals, their work is deemed essential. So they were still putting in their usual hours, but they were doing it without pay. Flight attendants work for private interests -- they're airline employees -- but they're also the ones who are most at risk as the infrastructure responsible for keeping planes in the air breaks down. There are Federal Aviation Administration rules requiring flight attendants to be present on planes of a certain size. In other words: flight attendants may not have been furloughed, but they had what could accurately be described as a vested interest in easing the strain the shutdown placed on air traffic controllers. The quiet finally broke on Friday. Faced with growing reports of air travel interruptions, representatives from the flight attendant and air traffic controller unions sounded an urgent alarm: fix this immediately or planes are going to start crashing. > Air traffic controllers "are making mistakes that they hadn't made in the 10, 15, 20 years .... They're making them because they're stressed out, because they don't know when this [shutdown] is going to end." > > --Trish Gilbert, National Air Traffic Controllers Assoc. > Via PBS pic.twitter.com/aIBN89GVWo > > -- Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) January 25, 2019 > Critical Update on Shutdown: Flight disruptions are starting. The system is unraveling as we had predicted. Watch this update and then get to your nearest congressional office to demand lawmakers open the government. https://t.co/fhLoiLnmfe #EndTheShutdown #StoptheShutdown pic.twitter.com/BBM9pynpcQ > > -- AFA-CWA (@afa_cwa) January 25, 2019 Hours later, the shutdown was over. It wasn't some bargaining breakthrough brokered by President Trump's fabled acumen as a deal-maker. Rather, it was the country's month-long transformation into trembling, overstuffed pressure cooker.  As many observers pointed out in the hours that followed, the final straw broke across the back of angry, exhausted aviation workers. > Here is the flight attendants' statement today. It is literally the only thing that matters. If you're crediting some rich plutocrat who derides "the lefties" for this shutdown ending, you're doing political analysis wrong.https://t.co/kG43aFdiIT > > -- Heidi N. Moore (@moorehn) January 26, 2019 > I am so proud of the air traffic controllers, flight attendants, & workers who, through their organizing, should be credited for their role in ending the shutdown. > > Dems only have the House (for now), so we must rely on the bravery + organizing of everyday people to push change. https://t.co/4vFzvZ1PrM > > -- Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 26, 2019 > Dems were glad to watch Trump's approval rating tank over these last weeks. Trump is not opening gov bc of Pelosi or Stone's arrest. He's opening gov because WORKERS shutdown a major US airport. Air traffic controllers, flight attendants & other WORKERS won this fight. https://t.co/f521EMFj4s > > -- Anya Parampil (@anyaparampil) January 26, 2019 > The temporary end of the shutdown isn't a victory for Nancy Pelosi or any other Democratic elected official. It's a victory for the airport workers who called in sick and threatened to go on strike. They raised the specter of airline chaos and forced Trump's hand. > > -- Micah Uetricht (@micahuetricht) January 25, 2019 > Anyway, as a footnote to this particularly miserable chapter of American history, it seems like the union closest to taking things to the next level to stop the shutdown was the Association of Flight Attendants: https://t.co/bxNqwhI9H9 > > -- Matt Pearce (@mattdpearce) January 25, 2019 > Relieved about the end of the shutdown today? > THANK A #UNION > Specifically: > Thank the @afa_cwa > Prez @FlyingWithSara > for mobilizing the #flightattendant force & declaring SAFETY as the urgent drive for #solidarity.https://t.co/pT35FH3yY9 > > -- Michael DeVito Jr. (@mdevitojr) January 25, 2019 > Trump couldn't take another night of air traffic controllers, pilots, flight attendants on TV saying flying isn't safe because of the Trump shutdown. https://t.co/iBHTB1Z0xb > > -- Lawrence O'Donnell (@Lawrence) January 25, 2019 Here's a final word from Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA and absolute boss of this moment. > .@lucymcbath, Flight Attendants Rock. That is all. > > -- Sara Nelson (@FlyingWithSara) January 26, 2019 UPDATED Jan. 26, 2019, 12:31 p.m. ET: An earlier version of this story incorrectly identified flight attendants as federal workers. Flight attendants work for the airlines, and their shutdown frustrations stem from a declining sense of safety as air traffic controllers increasingly felt the strain of absent paychecks. We apologize for the error, and have updated this story to make the distinction clearer. ## WATCH: This artist built an entire model plane out of nothing but manila envelopes

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://yhoo.it/2G2MWGX via Beauty Tips

from Blogger http://bit.ly/2CS3dLq

[teeky185]

Donald Trump's record-setting partial shutdown of the U.S. government -- which kept roughly 800,000 federal workers unpaid for more than a month -- is finally over. Don't forget to thank your flight attendants. In the end, no one person or group is solely responsible for making Trump back off the U.S.-Mexico border wall demand that left portions of American society crippled for more than a month. But on the shutdown's 35th day, hours before it finally ended, headlines were dominated by news of disrupted travel plans. SEE ALSO: Cardi B speaks out on government shutdown Air travel was one of the many categories of American life impacted by the shutdown. Air traffic controllers are federal workers, and as safety professionals, their work is deemed essential. So they were still putting in their usual hours, but they were doing it without pay. Flight attendants work for private interests -- they're airline employees -- but they're also the ones who are most at risk as the infrastructure responsible for keeping planes in the air breaks down. There are Federal Aviation Administration rules requiring flight attendants to be present on planes of a certain size. In other words: flight attendants may not have been furloughed, but they had what could accurately be described as a vested interest in easing the strain the shutdown placed on air traffic controllers. The quiet finally broke on Friday. Faced with growing reports of air travel interruptions, representatives from the flight attendant and air traffic controller unions sounded an urgent alarm: fix this immediately or planes are going to start crashing. > Air traffic controllers "are making mistakes that they hadn't made in the 10, 15, 20 years .... They're making them because they're stressed out, because they don't know when this [shutdown] is going to end." > > --Trish Gilbert, National Air Traffic Controllers Assoc. > Via PBS pic.twitter.com/aIBN89GVWo > > -- Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) January 25, 2019 > Critical Update on Shutdown: Flight disruptions are starting. The system is unraveling as we had predicted. Watch this update and then get to your nearest congressional office to demand lawmakers open the government. https://t.co/fhLoiLnmfe #EndTheShutdown #StoptheShutdown pic.twitter.com/BBM9pynpcQ > > -- AFA-CWA (@afa_cwa) January 25, 2019 Hours later, the shutdown was over. It wasn't some bargaining breakthrough brokered by President Trump's fabled acumen as a deal-maker. Rather, it was the country's month-long transformation into trembling, overstuffed pressure cooker.  As many observers pointed out in the hours that followed, the final straw broke across the back of angry, exhausted aviation workers. > Here is the flight attendants' statement today. It is literally the only thing that matters. If you're crediting some rich plutocrat who derides "the lefties" for this shutdown ending, you're doing political analysis wrong.https://t.co/kG43aFdiIT > > -- Heidi N. Moore (@moorehn) January 26, 2019 > I am so proud of the air traffic controllers, flight attendants, & workers who, through their organizing, should be credited for their role in ending the shutdown. > > Dems only have the House (for now), so we must rely on the bravery + organizing of everyday people to push change. https://t.co/4vFzvZ1PrM > > -- Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 26, 2019 > Dems were glad to watch Trump's approval rating tank over these last weeks. Trump is not opening gov bc of Pelosi or Stone's arrest. He's opening gov because WORKERS shutdown a major US airport. Air traffic controllers, flight attendants & other WORKERS won this fight. https://t.co/f521EMFj4s > > -- Anya Parampil (@anyaparampil) January 26, 2019 > The temporary end of the shutdown isn't a victory for Nancy Pelosi or any other Democratic elected official. It's a victory for the airport workers who called in sick and threatened to go on strike. They raised the specter of airline chaos and forced Trump's hand. > > -- Micah Uetricht (@micahuetricht) January 25, 2019 > Anyway, as a footnote to this particularly miserable chapter of American history, it seems like the union closest to taking things to the next level to stop the shutdown was the Association of Flight Attendants: https://t.co/bxNqwhI9H9 > > -- Matt Pearce (@mattdpearce) January 25, 2019 > Relieved about the end of the shutdown today? > THANK A #UNION > Specifically: > Thank the @afa_cwa > Prez @FlyingWithSara > for mobilizing the #flightattendant force & declaring SAFETY as the urgent drive for #solidarity.https://t.co/pT35FH3yY9 > > -- Michael DeVito Jr. (@mdevitojr) January 25, 2019 > Trump couldn't take another night of air traffic controllers, pilots, flight attendants on TV saying flying isn't safe because of the Trump shutdown. https://t.co/iBHTB1Z0xb > > -- Lawrence O'Donnell (@Lawrence) January 25, 2019 Here's a final word from Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA and absolute boss of this moment. > .@lucymcbath, Flight Attendants Rock. That is all. > > -- Sara Nelson (@FlyingWithSara) January 26, 2019 UPDATED Jan. 26, 2019, 12:31 p.m. ET: An earlier version of this story incorrectly identified flight attendants as federal workers. Flight attendants work for the airlines, and their shutdown frustrations stem from a declining sense of safety as air traffic controllers increasingly felt the strain of absent paychecks. We apologize for the error, and have updated this story to make the distinction clearer. ## WATCH: This artist built an entire model plane out of nothing but manila envelopes

from Yahoo News - Latest News & Headlines https://yhoo.it/2G2MWGX

[global-news-station]

New York’s La Guardia airport faced significant flight delays Friday as air traffic control struggled with staff shortages linked to the partial federal government shutdown, triggering renewed pressure for politicians to end the standoff.

The Federal Aviation Administration’s website said that arriving flights were being delayed an average of nearly 1.5 hours and that departures were also affected.

The nearby Newark, New Jersey and Philadelphia airports were also facing delays as a result.

An FAA spokesperson told AFP that the delays were caused by a “slight increase in sick leave.”

“We’ve mitigated the impact by augmenting staffing, rerouting traffic and increasing spacing between aircraft when needed,” the spokesperson added.

“The results have been minimal impacts to efficiency while maintaining consistent levels of safety in the national airspace system.”

The New York region’s third-largest airport, LaGuardia primarily serves domestic flights.

Around 158 outbound flights and 154 inbound flights were facing delays — nearly a quarter of each type of flight –, but only a small handful were cancelled, according to flight tracker FlightAware.

Most federal workers in American airports are now on their 35th day of working without pay due to a feud between Democratic lawmakers and President Donald Trump, who is demanding funding for a US-Mexico border wall.

The impact of the deadlock on aviation security has caused experts and Democratic lawmakers to raise the alarm.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi warned on Twitter that the shutdown was “pushing our airspace to the breaking point.”

“@realDonaldTrump, stop endangering the safety, security and well-being of our nation. Re-open government now!” she added.

Democratic National Committee Chair Tom Perez warned that “when our air traffic shuts down, the damage to our economy is enormous, millions of Americans are affected and our national security is endangered.”

Read More: U.S. government shutdown breaks record, with no end in sight

Without commenting on possible causes for the delays or how to resolve them, White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said: “the president has been briefed and we are monitoring the ongoing delays at some airports.”

“We are in regular contact with officials at the Department of Transportation and the FAA,” she added in a statement.

Aviation leaders’ warnings

Earlier this week, leaders of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, Air Line Pilots Association and Association of Flight Attendants warned that if the deadlock does not end soon, flights could be cut back around the country.

Control tower staffing is at a 30-year low due to no-shows, and the national flight grid was only holding up due to overtime work by controllers, some of whom are working 10-hour days and six-day workweeks.

Air traffic controllers, transportation security officers, safety inspectors and air marshals were not furloughed and have been working without pay.

“As predicted, the system is starting to unravel. This is only the beginning. Our safety professionals from @NATCA are fatigued, worried, and distracted,” tweeted AFA-CWA flight attendant union president Sara Nelson.

“But they won’t risk safety so the planes don’t fly. Dammit! #StopTheShutdown!”

United Airlines said that “at this point, we don’t anticipate significant schedule disruptions, but it is another good illustration of the escalating impact of the government shutdown and the need for the federal government to promptly re-open.”

Inside terminals in major airports, passenger inspection times are lengthening due to an increasing number of workers for the Transportation Safety Administration not showing up.

The TSA said this week there was a 7.6 per cent absence rate, compared to three per cent a year ago.

Many of the workers are facing financial difficulties, and some are unable to pay for transport to go to work or for childcare, and thus choose to call in sick instead.

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