AFL CIO Chairman Richard Trumka Jonathan Swan said in an interview for “Axios on HBO” that he wished President Biden hadn’t canceled the Keystone XL pipeline on its first day of work – because it will cost some well-paid union jobs.
Why this is important: Organized work is crucial to the Biden coalition. But there are significant tensions among environmentalists, the president’s team dealing with climate change, and some parts of the labor movement.
- The Laborers’ International Union of North America said the Keystone decision will cost 1,000 existing union jobs and 10,000 planned construction jobs.
- “The Laborers’ International was right,” said Trumka.
Between the lines: Trumka said he thought Biden had learned a lesson from his Keystone announcement and that he hopes the president will combine future decisions that would destroy union jobs with simultaneous and specific announcements about how those jobs would be replaced.
- “If you destroy 100 jobs in Greene County, Pennsylvania, where I grew up, and you create 100 jobs in California, it doesn’t do those 100 families much good,” Trumka said.
- “If you look at a pipeline and you say we’re going to put it down, what are you going to do to create the same well-paid jobs in that area?”
- Trumka also seemed uncomfortable – pausing for a few seconds and dodging the question – when asked if he was comfortable with Biden’s plan to ban fracking on federal land.
- White House spokesman Vedant Patel said, “President Biden has proposed transformative investments in infrastructure that will not only create millions of good union jobs, but also help tackle the climate crisis.”
It comes down to: Trumka, who began his career as a miner, said he will not be patient with promises of retraining programs as a consolation for union workers forced from their jobs.
- “You know, when they got fired from the mines in Pennsylvania, they told us they were going to train us to be computer programmers.”
- “And I said, ‘Where are the computer programmer’s jobs?’ “Uh, they’re in, uh, Oklahoma and they’re in Vegas and they’re here.” And I said, “So, in other words, we’re going to be unemployed miners and unemployed computer programmers too.” ‘
People love where they live and they love the people of that area, “Trumka said.” And for them that is home. And that’s their culture. “
- “I think what is not well enough understood in the country, especially in DC politics, is that that culture is very important to the people who live there.”
Editor’s Note: Updates with White House commentary.