US railroads fear labor unrest over vaccine mandates

US railroads Union Pacific (UP) and Norfolk Southern (NS) are asking a federal court to bar union employees from striking or calling out sick in response to the carriers' vaccine mandates.

UP and NS, in separate filings, have urged the US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois to declare that unions' objections to vaccine mandates be deemed a "minor dispute" under the Railway Labor Act and subject to mandatory arbitration. "Self-help" actions such as strikes, picket lines or work slowdowns are not permitted in such disputes.

Western carrier UP filed suit against three unions, the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers (SMART); the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen; and the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes on 15 October to try to prevent any such actions. Eastern carrier NS filed a similar suit on 21 October.

While railroad unions have been vocal in their opposition to vaccine mandates, the two carriers said they are complying with President Joe Biden's 9 September executive order requiring that federal contractors be fully vaccinated by 8 December. Both carriers are federal contractors.

"This was not our idea," NS chief executive James Squires said today. "This was not our initiative." Squires said the executive order "clearly applies to us, and we must comply."

NS told the court individual union members "have begun threatening to engage in walk-outs, sick-outs, slow-downs or other forms of self-help" in response to the railroad's vaccine mandate.

Railroad unions have objected to the imposition of any vaccine mandates, saying any such policy change should be negotiated as part of collective bargaining agreements, according to documents filed with the court.

SMART, in a 11 October letter to UP, said that while it recognizes "the seriousness of the pandemic," these conditions do not permit the railroad "to institute an arbitrary policy, which will have a sweeping effect on the current working conditions" at the carrier.

The Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employes, in a 1 October letter to UP chief executive Lance Fritz, said it "strongly believes the choice to receive or to not receive the Covid-19 vaccination is the choice of an individual, and ‘God given' choice, that should not be infringed upon."

Union officials did not immediately respond to inquiries.

Squires acknowledged NS probably will lose some employees over the vaccine mandate but added: "We will work very hard to retain them."

By David Ivanovich