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Top Rail Unions Denounce Union Pacific-Norfolk Southern Megamerger as 'De Facto Monopoly'
"For rail customers, it will be a choice between ‘Hell or the highway,’” said Mark Wallace, the national president of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen.
Dec 17, 2025
Two of America's largest railway workers unions have come out against the $85 billion merger of two major railroad conglomerates, warning that it will harm competition and worker safety.
The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET) and the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees Division (BMWED) represent more than half of the employees at the Union Pacific Railroad and the Norfolk Southern Corporation, which it plans to acquire.
The US Surface Transportation Board (STB) is expected to receive a formal proposal from the two companies on Friday. President Donald Trump said in September that the deal "sounds good" to him.
If approved, it would allow the two firms to merge into the largest railroad company in US history, controlling more than 50,000 miles of track across 43 states. According to the Associated Press, such a railroad would likely control over 40% of the nation's freight.
The unions warned on Wednesday that the deal would create a "de facto monopoly" in large swaths of the country.
“We believe this transcontinental railroad will make shipping by rail less attractive as the merged carrier passes off rail lines that serve small towns, factories, and farms to short line railroads while running miles-long slow-moving trains on the main line," said BLET national president Mark Wallace. "For rail customers, it will be a choice between ‘Hell or the highway.’”
Loosened merger regulations by Congress have allowed railway companies to consolidate over the past 40 years. As the unions point out, in 1980 there were roughly 40 different Class 1 railroads in the US, whereas in 2025 they have combined into just six entities.
An October analysis by the American Economic Liberties Project, which warned against the Norfolk Southern-Union Pacific merger, noted that as a result of this consolidation, "shippers reported a deterioration in service, fewer options with higher prices... while workers lost jobs and those who didn’t face strenuous working conditions."
While the unions credited Norfolk Southern’s spending on new safety measures following 2023’s catastrophic derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, they said that Union Pacific “continues to cut corners and oppose needed reforms.”
During the Biden administration, federal regulators found that Union Pacific made a concerted effort to undermine government safety assessments, including coaching employees on how to respond to questions from the Federal Railroad Administration and threatening them with discipline if they did not give the company's preferred responses.
The merger has received backing from SMART-TD, the nation's largest railroad union, which cited promises from Union Pacific CEO Jim Vena not to lay off workers as a result of the acquisition.
But BLET and BMWED say these promises are hollow and that the proposal given to unions still allows the company to have the ultimate say over which workers are protected and provides no guarantees for employees against being transferred to jobs hundreds of miles away or from having their lines sold to short line railroads that pay less.
“We don’t believe anything Vena says about how workers would be treated in the Supersized Union Pacific,” said Tony Cardwell, president of the BMWED. “The agreements reached with some other unions related to job protections post-merger have loopholes big enough to traverse freight trains through. We refuse to accept the same terms in return for our unions’ support for the merger.”
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Analysis Warns of 'Disastrous Consequences' From $72 Billion Railway Megamerger
"The last 40 years of railroad consolidation clearly demonstrate how this merger could threaten public safety and harm shippers, workers, consumers, and the broader economy," said an economic analyst.
Oct 21, 2025
A merger between two of America's biggest railroad companies could have "disastrous consequences" for workers and consumers, according to a report out Monday.
In late July, labor unions raised alarm as Union Pacific Railroad announced a $72 billion deal to acquire Norfolk Southern Railway, which, if approved by the US Surface Transportation Board (STB), would make the new entity the largest railroad company in American history, controlling over 50,000 total miles of interstate rail.
The American Economic Liberties Project (AELP), an anti-monopoly think tank, provided more evidence for those concerns with its new analysis.
"A combined Union Pacific-Norfolk Southern will have disastrous consequences: less safe workers and communities, less competition, higher costs, and service disruptions," said one of the report's authors, AELP senior fellow Erik Peinert. "For good reason, there has never been an attempt at a consolidated transcontinental railroad system until now—a scale of railroad consolidation not even met by the railroad barons of the Gilded Age."
As the report explains, America's interstate rail system is dominated by four companies that operate as a pair of "regional duopolies." Norfolk Southern lines stretch across the Eastern US, along with those owned by CSX, while areas west of the Mississippi River are covered by Union Pacific and BNSF.
This already heavily consolidated system is the product of Congress' deregulation of railroads during the 1980s and 1990s, most notably through the replacement in 1995 of the more powerful Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) with the STB, which has more limited authority to regulate mergers.
"Even by the very lax merger standards of the late 1990s and early 2000s, these combinations were recognized as mistakes with devastating outcomes," the report says. "Shippers reported a deterioration in service, fewer options with higher prices, and the loss of jobs, while workers lost jobs and those who didn't face strenuous working conditions."
Though STB's rules tightened in 2001, requiring mergers to "enhance" competition instead of simply not harming it, the damage was already done. Over the next two decades, the report noted that the top four major railroads came to haul 7% fewer loads while hiking freight rates twice as fast as inflation. This was due in large part to the fact that 50% of customers were now "captive," that is, they had access to only one rail line, compared to just 27% two decades prior.
Another megamerger, the report warns, would cause a "likely permanent loss of competitive rail services for shippers" in large sections of the country, specifically the Midwest, where Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern have overlapping lines.
The deal has been opposed by a consortium of shipping associations, including the Freight Rail Customer Alliance, the American Chemistry Council, and the National Industrial Transport League (NITL), which warned that it would slow down service and lead to price hikes.
Labor unions—including the Teamsters, the Transport Workers Union of America, and the Railroad Workers United—have also opposed the merger, citing the companies' histories of cutting costs by laying off employees and flouting safety standards.
"Historically, rail consolidation results in job loss, diminishing labor power in negotiating better working conditions and pay, resulting in staffing shortages that lead to burnout and increased safety risks for workers and the public," the report says. "And in general, consolidation results in stagnant and reduced wages for workers, as there are fewer buyers for labor and greater leverage for the consolidated companies."
There is also a risk that if the STB approves the merger, it could embolden the other half of the duopoly, CSX and BNSF, to merge as well, creating a national duopoly where "choice and competition would be lost."
In part due to the STB's more stringent rules, no interstate railroads have attempted to merge in the 21st century. However, the Trump administration seemed to give Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern a green light when—just as proceedings for the merger were beginning in late August—President Donald Trump fired Robert Primus, a Democratic member of the STB who had been an outspoken critic of railroad consolidation, which broke a 2-2 tie on the board between Democrats and Republicans.
At the beginning of October, Primus sued the Trump administration, which had not explained his firing other than that he "did not align with the president's America First agenda." After meeting with the CEO of Union Pacific in September, Trump said that the merger "sounds good."
"Our country's supply chain demands that the board be independent and transparent. Congress mandated it 138 years ago," Primus said upon filing the lawsuit. "Failure to do so will negatively affect the network: railroads, shippers, and rail labor alike, disrupting the supply chain and ultimately injecting instability into our nation's economy. This is dangerous, and wrong, and cannot be allowed to happen."
Railroad Workers United said that Primus "was removed not for inefficiency or malfeasance, but for daring to stand for fair competition and consumer interests, a principle too radical for the 'America First' cabal."
Ashley Nowicki, the report's other author and a policy analyst at the AELP, said that the firing of Primus, "who questioned rail consolidation and the railroad's substantial lobbying efforts, raises serious concerns about political interference."
"The last 40 years of railroad consolidation clearly demonstrate how this merger could threaten public safety and harm shippers, workers, consumers, and the broader economy," she continued. "The Surface Transportation Board must show it can operate independently and protect the public interest over Wall Street."
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Rail Workers Warn Union Pacific-Norfolk Southern Merger Would 'Simply Line the Pockets of Wall Street'
Railroad Workers United expressed opposition to any further consolidation of the U.S. rail system—unless it was brought under public ownership.
Aug 11, 2025
An inter-union U.S. rail coalition on Monday announced its formal opposition to Union Pacific's $85 billion bid to purchase Norfolk Southern and any other private consolidation of railroad giants, warning that such mergers serve only to enrich investors at the expense of workers, passengers, and communities across the nation.
Railroad Workers United (RWU)'s steering committee adopted a resolution outlining its opposition to the pending Union Pacific (UP)-Norfolk Southern (NS) deal, noting that rail mergers "have more often than not been fraught with inefficiencies, confusion, service disruptions, clogged terminals, staffing shortages, exhausted workers, and general malaise."
RWU "opposes this UP-NS merger as well as any and all takeovers, mergers, or other combinations of the remaining Class One railroads under the current system of private ownership," the resolution states.
"The only further consolidation of the continent's rail system that RWU would support is one that is publicly owned—how most nations' rail infrastructure is owned and operated today—and where the railroad workers are included in all aspects of managing railroad operations," the document concludes.
"Further corporate rail mergers today will do little for rail development but simply line the pockets of Wall Street investors at everyone else's expense."
RWU joins other prominent rail labor leaders and policy experts who have expressed deep concerns about the proposed takeover, which is part of a wave of mergers in the U.S. industrial sector this year under the Trump administration. The UP-NS merger still must receive federal approval.
"If the Union-Pacific-Norfolk Southern merger is approved, BNSF, the other western railroad—owned by Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway—will almost certainly pursue CSX, the other eastern railroad, to avoid being boxed out," Arnav Rao, a transportation policy analyst at the Open Markets Institute, warned in a piece for Washington Monthly last week.
"If the United States is serious about reshoring manufacturing, it cannot afford to let its rail system become a duopoly," Rao added. "Allowing Union Pacific to absorb Norfolk Southern would leave just two national carriers, each with incalculable leverage over customers, workers, and regulators."
The day the merger proposal was announced last month, SMART Transportation Division (SMART-TD)—the largest railroad operating union in the U.S.—said it has "every intention to oppose" the deal, pointing to UP's record of "hostility" toward organized labor, willingness to lay off workers even during good periods for the industry, and "troubling safety record."
In a statement on Monday, RWU called on "all shipping groups, passenger train advocates, environmentalists, and especially railroad workers and our unions to oppose further mergers of rail corporations."
Pointing to the infamous robber barons of the Gilded Age, RWU organizer Matt Weaver said that "such concentration of wealth and power among a handful of men was not a good idea then and it is not a good idea today."
"They had a stranglehold on the economy and the rail workforce," said Weaver. "Further corporate rail mergers today will do little for rail development but simply line the pockets of Wall Street investors at everyone else's expense."
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Rail Labor Leaders Raise Alarm Over Union Pacific-Norfolk Southern Megamerger
"Our labor organization has every intention to oppose this merger," said SMART-TD, America's largest railroad operating union.
Jul 29, 2025
Major unions on Tuesday slammed plans for an $85 billion merger between railway giants Norfolk Southern and Union Pacific.
As The New York Times reported, the proposed merger would have the benefit of creating the first rail network in the U.S. that would span from coast to coast and would run through 43 different states by linking Norfolk Southern's eastern railroads with Union Pacific's western rail network.
On the downside, however, it would represent a massive consolidation of the American rail industry by giving one corporation control of roughly 40% of rail freight throughout the U.S., and it was immediately panned by labor leaders as bad for railway workers.
SMART Transportation Division (SMART-TD), America's largest railroad operating union, said that "our labor organization has every intention to oppose this merger when it comes before the Surface Transportation Board for approval."
The union specified multiple concerns about the deal, including what it described as Union Pacific's "troubling safety record" under its current management.
"Publicly available data from recent years reveals [Union Pacific] leads the industry in accidents, incidents, injuries, and fatalities," the union said. "This trend reflects a broader corporate culture that, in our view, prioritizes aggressive operating ratios over worker and public safety."
SMART-TD also criticized Union Pacific for having "a pattern of disengagement and hostility" toward labor relations, while also expressing concerns that Norfolk Southern, which it describes as having "more progressive labor and operation policies," could adopt Union Pacific's tactics under a merger.
The Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen (BRS) raised similar concerns about worker safety and laid out a list of demands that would have to be met before it would give the merger its blessing. Namely, the union said that "safety standards must be strengthened not sidelined, in the name of efficiency," and that "signal staffing must not be cut further." BRS also demanded "direct labor consultation during all phases of integration" and "enforceable safety guarantees and transparency in operational changes."
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Privatizing Amtrak Would Be a Disaster for Working People
Privatization of public institutions has an observable record of raising prices for customers, diminishing service quality, and degrading working conditions.
Jun 27, 2025
At a Senate Commerce subcommittee hearing earlier this month, former car salesman, wage thief, and current Ohio Sen. Bernie Moreno said the U.S. government should stop funding Amtrak, and argued in favor of handing it over to the private sector. Moreno and his ilk—including former White House dog, Elon Musk—perpetuate an old and tired right-wing tradition that is at best confused and at worst conniving: bashing all that serves the public good and venerating all that transfers wealth to private moneyed interests.
One might be tempted to give Moreno, Musk, and other practitioners of the ancient religion of market worship the benefit of the doubt; perhaps they really believe what they say. Maybe they truly think concentrating wealth and institutional control in the hands of a few corporate masters is what’s best for everyone. If that is the case, they are both far too bewildered, their minds far too infantile, to be in any positions of power and influence.
On the other hand, if Moreno and Musk are not in fact confused, then they must be aware that what they say is completely false. Privatization of public institutions has an observable record of raising prices for customers, diminishing service quality, and degrading working conditions. They know privatization is not good for the public, but it is good for private moneyed interests, like Moreno’s wealthy campaign contributors and billionaires like Musk, and that is what matters most to them.
It is clear that if we want a passenger rail system that consistently, effectively, and conveniently serves the public, the last thing we should do is privatize Amtrak.
For all the talk about Amtrak’s inefficiency, the record tells a different tale. Even with inadequate federal funding, Amtrak has made significant accomplishments. For example, though rail travel decreased during the Covid-19 pandemic, Amtrak set all-time records for ridership and revenue in FY24. In fact, Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor (NEC) ridership was 12% higher in FY24 than it was in FY19, before the pandemic struck, and the NEC’s FY24 operating cost recovery, at 123%, far exceeded the 100% statutory goal.
Speaking of efficiency—just how “efficient” is the private sector, anyway? Hack economists tell us that efficiency means getting the same or better results at a lower cost. A corporation gutting their workforce and skimping on maintenance to obtain higher profits is, by this logic, acting efficiently. The efficiency of a private business, therefore, depends on how much profit it can squeeze out of fewer workers, with cheaper materials, in worse conditions, and at greater risk to surrounding communities.
By laying off workers, cutting costs, neglecting maintenance, lengthening trains, and eschewing capacity expansion, the Class I railroads, with their Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR) business model, must be sublimely efficient. After all, with after-tax profits in the billions, railroad corporations like Norfolk Southern, BNSF, and CSX must be doing something right. Just ask the folks in East Palestine, Ohio, how marvelously efficient Norfolk Southern is.
And there’s the rub. When priests of private enterprise like Moreno and Musk say public services should be privatized because the private sector is more efficient, they mean private entities deliver higher profits to their owners, not that they better serve the needs of the public. In fact, even when services and institutions are privatized, the public still pays for them in numerous ways—with lower wages and worse jobs, decreased or eliminated benefits, displacement, money siphoned away from communities into private pockets, and so on.
For example, a 2009 study showed that, following privatization and outsourcing, food service workers’ wages in New Jersey K-12 schools were cut by $4-6, and many workers completely lost their health insurance benefits. In 2011, privatization of nursing assistant jobs at a home for veterans in Michigan saw the starting wage lowered to $8.50 an hour with no health insurance or pension benefits. Public nursing assistants, on the other hand, received $15-20 an hour, health insurance, and pensions.
In regards to rail, one can simply look across the Atlantic to see the results of rail privatization. Margaret Thatcher, high priestess in the cult of the market, privatized various public services, including some connected to the rail system. Her successor, John Major, started the process of privatizing the British rail system in 1993-4, and by 1997 the U.K.’s national rail system was under corporate control.
If anything, we should be asking ourselves why so many critical industries, like the Class I freight railroads, remain in private hands when our needs would be better served if these industries were publicly owned and operated.
The privatization of British rail was disastrous. Higher fares, deteriorated service, rampant underbidding by franchisees who then abandoned agreements, and neglected infrastructure that cost people their lives. In the first three years after privatization, 38 people died in rail accidents, and in October 2000, four people died in a derailment that was entirely preventable. The private owners, Railtrack, knew about the cracked rail that caused the derailment, but refused to fix it. These people were sacrifices made at the altar of profit. Talk about “efficiency.”
Recognizing that these devastating events were caused largely by the egregious negligence of private owners, Britain renationalized its rail infrastructure in 2002. A 2012 GfK NOP poll revealed that 70% of the 1,000 Britons surveyed were in favor of returning the rail system to public ownership. In October 2022, YouGov reported that a majority of British voters, including Conservatives, believe that utilities such as rail, water, and energy should be in the public sector.
After decades of failure under the experiment of privatization, the U.K.’s Labour government is currently taking steps to renationalize the British rail system. In the United States, we should understand what happened across the pond as a case study for what not to do. Privatization, in terms of its service to the public, was a complete flop. There is no reason to believe the privatization of Amtrak would be less of a flop.
It is worth noting that while Elon Musk was castigating Amtrak at a tech conference earlier this year, he compared Amtrak unfavorably to China’s exceptional high-speed passenger trains. In calling for privatization of “anything that can be privatized” while at the same time praising a state-owned rail system (he even called China’s trains “epic”), Musk showed the disingenuousness, or incoherence, of the market religion he shares with Moreno and many other delirious practitioners.
With all this in mind, it is clear that if we want a passenger rail system that consistently, effectively, and conveniently serves the public, the last thing we should do is privatize Amtrak. With increased (and long overdue) federal funding, Amtrak can invest in infrastructure and equipment upgrades and repairs, create thousands of well-paying union jobs across the country, and better serve passengers.
If anything, we should be asking ourselves why so many critical industries, like the Class I freight railroads, remain in private hands when our needs would be better served if these industries were publicly owned and operated. Why not democratize these enterprises? Wouldn’t you like a say?
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The Case for Public Ownership of US Railways
The toxic rail derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, was a symptom of a privatized rail system that prioritizes profit over public safety.
Aug 04, 2024
The National Transportation Safety Board announced in June that the infamous East Palestine, Ohio, freight train derailment was caused by a defective wheel bearing.
But that technical issue does not tell the whole story.
Federal investigators found that the railway company Norfolk Southern failed to communicate information to emergency responders in a timely manner, which contributed to the exposure of responders and the public to post-derailment hazards.
According to the June 2024 NTSB report abstract on the derailment and hazardous materials release, Norfolk Southern’s delayed transmission of consist information “also delayed the Ohio State Patrol’s recommendation to the incident commander that the shelter-in-place order be replaced by an evacuation.”
Norfolk Southern officials and contractors also provided misleading and incomplete information while advocating for an unnecessary vent and burn of tank cars carrying vinyl chloride. A vent-and-burn action is, according to the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), a response of last resort.
A public rail system would directly benefit workers, trackside communities, small shippers, farmers, passengers, and the environment.
Norfolk Southern began planning the vent and burn shortly after the derailment, rejecting three other removal methods that could have been far less dangerous to responders and the people of East Palestine.
While there may be some temptation to view the catastrophic derailment in East Palestine as an unfortunate fluke, the truth is that disastrous events are predictable features of the American rail system.
Under the private ownership of the Class I railroads, we have seen time and again the callous prioritization of profit over people. For the sake of short-term profit, inspections are cut short, tracks and equipment are not maintained, and the rail workforce is gutted — features of an industrial system that calculates derailments as part of the cost of doing business.
The Class I railroads’ — the largest domestic rail carriers — pursuit of short-term profit has led to critical understaffing, longer trains, diminished maintenance of tracks and equipment, inadequate inspections, and other underinvestments that leave rail workers and trackside communities vulnerable to derailments and disasters.
The Class I railroad robber barons are perfectly willing to risk the lives of workers and people living in trackside communities so long as it means more money for them and their shareholders. This is not hyperbole.
Between 2013 and 2022, the rate of rail accidents rose 28 percent as a result of the implementation of Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR). In short, the philosophy of PSR can be summed up as “speed over safety.” Since 2015, over 50,000 railroad workers — nearly 30 percent of the rail workforce — have been laid off. The workers who remain on the railroads experience chronic fatigue as a result of unpredictable schedules and critical understaffing.
Last spring, it was reported that Union Pacific, one of the six Class I rail carriers, undermined government safety assessments and retaliated against workers who reported rail car flaws. In 2023, the FRA found that 73% of Union Pacific locomotives have federal defects.
According to the NTSB, Norfolk Southern interfered with the East Palestine investigation and abused its status as a party to the probe. NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy revealed that she was threatened by Norfolk Southern during a private exchange with a senior company executive two weeks prior to the NTSB East Palestine board meeting.
These are but a few examples of the criminality and nefariousness that characterize the privately owned rail system. What’s more, even if one puts aside moral questions regarding the behavior of the Class I railroads, one finds an industry being strangled to death by a get-rich-quick scheme that victimizes workers and trackside communities, cheats small shippers, and — because the rail robber barons are completely allergic to capital expenditure —dooms the US rail system to degradation and ossification.
Another concern is how the American rail system is regulated. While the FRA is ostensibly tasked with overseeing and regulating US railroads, this arrangement becomes murky when one considers the significant degree of industry influence.
The Association of American Railroads (AAR), the industry group representing the interests of North America’s major rail corporations, sets its own safety standards and works closely with the FRA, effectively as an independent regulatory body. AAR even manages the FRA’s Transportation Technology Center through its wholly-owned subsidiary, Transportation Technology Center, Inc.
In the NTSB investigation of the East Palestine derailment, AAR’s standards for hot bearing alerts and alarms came under scrutiny, as they served as the guide for Norfolk Southern’s own criteria that contributed to the disaster. It is worth noting that under the Trump presidency, railroad industry executive Ronald Batory was made FRA administrator, further blurring the line between government regulator and regulated industry.
With the foxes running the henhouse, simple demands for more and better regulation of the railroad industry are inadequate. The real solution, advocated by Railroad Workers United (RWU) and allied organizations across the country, is public ownership of the railroads.
Last spring, RWU launched the Public Rail Ownership (PRO) campaign, building a diverse coalition including rank-and-file unionists, environmentalists, progressives, community activists, and others calling for a rail system that operates in the public interest.
The campaign has hosted webinars, published scholarly works such as Maddock Thomas’s “Putting America Back on Track: The Case for a 21st Century Public Rail System,” and attended union conferences to make its case.
What a publicly owned and operated rail system in the United States will look like has yet to be determined, but there are models that can serve as guides.
The task at hand is massive, and the road ahead is fraught with challenges. However, there is little hope for any improvement of the US rail system so long as it remains in the hands of the irresponsible and unaccountable Class I robber barons.
The rail system in the US is, compared to other countries, an anomaly in that it is predominantly owned by private companies. This was not always the case, and there’s inspiration to be found in US history for the development of a 21st century public rail system.
During World War I, the US rail system was nationalized amid a consensus that the private rail system was unable to serve the needs of the country during wartime. Under the control of the US Railroad Administration (USRA), the railroads operated far more efficiently and effectively than they had under private ownership.
Working conditions and service improved drastically, winning the support of workers, shippers, and much of the public. The nationalized rail system was so popular among rail workers that in a 1918 American Federation of Labor-sponsored referendum, the vote to keep the nation’s railroads in public hands was overwhelmingly in favor: 306,720 to 1,466.
A public rail system would directly benefit workers, trackside communities, small shippers, farmers, passengers, and the environment. The Class I carriers have made it clear that they have no intent to expand rail, or take the crucial step towards full catenary electrification.
Under public ownership, the fetters of the short-term profit motive would be cast off the rail system, opening the door to large-scale infrastructure modernization and expansion projects, creating jobs in construction and spurring economic development in neglected areas of the country. A publicly owned and operated rail system would also create thousands of railroad jobs, as the stripped-to-the-bone PSR model advocated by the Class I carriers would be destined for the dustbin.
The task at hand is massive, and the road ahead is fraught with challenges. However, there is little hope for any improvement of the US rail system so long as it remains in the hands of the irresponsible and unaccountable Class I robber barons. RWU and its allies invite all organizations and individuals to get involved in the Public Rail Ownership campaign, and help make public rail a reality. For more information, please visit publicrailnow.org.
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'Reprehensible': NTSB Chair Says Norfolk Southern Interfered With East Palestine Probe
The NTSB chair said the company tried to "manufacture" evidence, avoided sharing information, and threatened agency staff as she released findings from a 17-month investigation into the East Palestine disaster.
Jun 26, 2024
The chair of the National Transportation Safety Board on Tuesday condemned Norfolk Southern for interfering with its investigation into last year's East Palestine train crash and the "vent and burn" of harmful chemicals that followed.
The remarks came at the final NTSB hearing on the disaster, in which the agency released a preliminary report—damning to Norfolk Southern and its contractors—from a 17-month investigation. NTSB officials explained that a decision to intentionally burn vinyl chloride, a carcinogen, from five derailed train cars was flawed and resulted from the company's selective sharing of information with officials at the time.
Norfolk Southern's uncooperative approach didn't stop after the vent-and-burn, according to the NTSB. Throughout the investigation, the company delayed or avoided sharing information, sought to "manufacture" evidence, and even issued a "threat" to agency staff, Jennifer Homendy, the NTSB chair, said.
"Norfolk Southern's abuse of the party process was unprecedented and reprehensible," Homendy said, also describing it as "unconscionable."
She praised NTSB investigators "for their fortitude in the face of mounting pressure, for their laser focus on the facts."
Why is this so predictable? The head of the NTSB said Norfolk Southern repeatedly tried to interfere with the agency’s investigation into the East Palestine derailment. Oh, and the venting and burning of the chemicals was unnecessary and they failed to disclose it, too.
“Norfolk… pic.twitter.com/BrKYD0Cm6s
— Truthstream Media (@truthstreamnews) June 26, 2024
Dozens of train cars derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, a village near the Pennsylvania border, on February 3, 2023. Hazardous materials were released when a DOT-111 model of train car—not ideal for carrying hazardous materials—was punctured during the crash. This set off fires that spread more than 1,000 feet and lasted for days.
On February 6, concerned that there would be a large-scale explosion, the company got official approval to breach five train cars carrying the vinyl chloride, drained it into a trench, and set it alight in a controlled burn.
That vent-and-burn was "not necessary," says the NTSB's new report, which is set to be finalized in the coming weeks. Homendy had previously said as much while testifying to a congressional committee in March, and a former Environmental Protection Agency employee also said that the incineration likely went against federal regulations, as Common Dreams reported in March.
The burning of the vinyl chloride left a chemical odor over the town, and may have been the cause of nausea, rashes, and headaches. And its impact was not limited to East Palestine—the burned chemicals spread to 16 states and likely Canada, a study released last week found.
Tuesday's hearing helped clarify why the flawed decision to burn the vinyl chloride was made: Norfolk Southern didn't share all available information with authorities, and pressured them to approve the burn immediately.
Oxy Vinyls, the company that produced the chemical, had already assessed the situation and determined that a feared chemical reaction that could have led to an explosion wasn't happening, but Norfolk Southern didn't share this with the incident commander, the report says. The East Palestine fire chief has said the company gave him only 13 minutes to approve the burn; the new report cites "unwarranted urgency."
Norfolk Southern presented vent-and-burn as the only option, the report says.
"There was another option: Let it cool down," Homendy said previously.
In fact, the temperature of one of the train cars in question was already going down, indicating that the feared chemical reaction wasn't happening, but Norfolk Southern didn't share this fact with authorities, the report says.
The company's lack of transparency began even earlier: Firefighters and emergency personnel weren't told which hazardous materials were on board until an hour after they arrived.
"This resulted in greater exposure of emergency responders and to the public to post-derailment hazards," said NTSB investigator Troy Lloyd.
When a responder called Norfolk Southern to ask for more information about the materials on board, a company representative said they would call back, but never did, The Washington Post reported.
Krissy Ferguson, a 50-year-old local resident, told the Post that she felt "heartbroken" after the hearing and called for criminal charges to be filed.
Other local people expressed similar discontent with the company after the hearing.
"Community members deserve transparency and proactive protection, not the silence, secrecy, and manipulation that has been unveiled today about Norfolk Southern," East Palestine resident Misti Allison told The Associated Press.
Homendy expressed her own discontent with Norfolk Southern's approach to dealing with her agency. She said that a senior executive had requested that the agency "put to bed" the "rumor" that the company had rushed through the vent-and-burn to keep trains moving and had said that the results of the agency's investigation could "close a chapter" for the company and allow it to "move on."
Homendy said the request was not only "unethical and inappropriate," but also that the entire room full of NTSB staff perceived it as a "threat," as "it was delivered that way."
The alleged intimidation didn't have apparent effect. In addition to its findings about the accident and the burn, the NTSB on Tuesday set forth more than two dozen recommendations for stricter safety regulations, one of which is removing the DOT-111 model of train car from flammable liquids service.
The recommendations are not binding and must be enacted by Congress, which failed to pass a proposed package of railroad reforms last year likely due to industry lobbying and Republican resistance. The Biden administration did institute new regulations in April.
Norfolk Southern issued a statement in response to the NTSB's findings.
"We resolved not to wait for the NTSB's final report before taking decisive action," said John Fleps, the company's chief safety officer. "We will continue to build on our strong safety culture through partnership and innovation to be the gold standard of safety for the rail industry."
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Chemicals From East Palestine Train Disaster Spread to 16 States: Study
Fires after the February 2023 accident caused plumes of toxic chemicals to spread farther than researchers anticipated. "I think we should be concerned," an expert said.
Jun 19, 2024
Toxic chemicals released during fires following the Norfolk Southern train derailment in Ohio last year spread to 16 states and likely Canada, according to a study released Wednesday.
The pollution, some of which came from the burning of vinyl chloride, a carcinogen, spread over 540,000 square miles, showing clearly that "the impacts of the fire were larger in scale and scope than the initial predictions," the authors of the study, published in Environmental Research Letters, found.
Lead author David Gay, coordinator of the National Atmospheric Deposition Program, said that he was very surprised by the way the chemicals had spread. "I didn't expect to see an impact this far out," he told The Washington Post.
Gay said the results did not mean "death and destruction," as concentrations were low on an absolute scale—"not melting steel or eating paint off buildings"—but that they were still "very extreme" compared to normal, with measurements higher than recorded in the previous ten years.
"I think we should be concerned," Juliane Beier, an expert on vinyl chloride effects who didn't take part in the study, told the Post, citing the possibility of long-term environmental impacts on communities.
A Norfolk Southern train crashed in East Palestine, Ohio, a village near the Pennsylvania border and the Appalachian foothills, on February 3, 2023. Dozens of train cars derailed, at least 11 of which were carrying hazardous materials, some of which caught fire after the accident and burned for days. Fearing a large-scale explosion, authorities drained the vinyl chloride from five cars into a trench and set it alight in a controlled burn.
A former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency official later said that the controlled burn went against EPA rules; the head of the National Transportation Safety Board said the deliberate burning was unnecessary.
The local impact of the fires was felt acutely in the month after the accident—a "potent chemical odor hung in the air for weeks," according to The Guardian, and people reported nausea, rashes, and headaches.
The new study helps explain the wider environmental impact. The researchers looked at inorganic compound samples in rain and snow at 260 sites. The highest levels of chloride were found in northern Pennsylvania and near the Canada-New York border, which was downwind from the accident. The authors also found "exceptionally high" pH levels in rain as far away as northern Maine. They did not look at organic compounds such as dioxin or PFAS, which likely also spread following the accident, The Guardian reported. The elevated inorganic chemical levels dropped two to three weeks after the accident.
Norfolk Southern has agreed to pay nearly $1 billion in damages following two settlements reached in recent months. In April, the company reached a $600 million deal with class action plaintiffs living within 20 miles of the derailment site. That deal won't be finalized until the residents officially agree. In May, the company reached a separate $310 million settlement with the federal government. The company has said that it has already spent $107 million on community support and removed the impacted soil.
Norfolk Southern makes billions in profits every year, and the company gave its CEO a 37% pay hike last year, drawing widespread criticism. The company also spent $2.3 million on federal lobbying last year, according to OpenSecrets data reported by Roll Call.
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Ban Stock Buybacks to Curb Inequality and Save Lives
Every dollar spent lining the pockets of CEOs and investors is a dollar less to upgrade equipment and protect workers and the public.
May 06, 2024
Shares of Apple lost 10% of their value in the first four months of the year. This may explain why Apple announced on Thursday that its board authorized $110 billion in stock buybacks, the largest buyback in U.S. history. It may also explain why, on Saturday, Warren Buffett—the “Oracle of Omaha”—announced that his company, Berkshire-Hathaway, would sell a big portion of its stake in Apple.
It is impossible to understand what’s happening to the American economy without considering the surge of stock buybacks—in which a corporation buys back shares of its own stock to artificially boost its share price, by creating fewer outstanding shares.
Large corporations are now devoting nearly 70% of their profits to buybacks.
Abbott Labs spent $5 billion on stock buybacks while allowing plant conditions to deteriorate to the point where bacterial contamination of baby formula resulted in infant deaths and a nationwide formula shortage.
Stock buybacks have also become a major force behind widening inequality. They mostly benefit CEOs and the richest 1% of the public, who own more than half of all shares of stock owned by Americans.
There is no reason for them. Before Ronald Reagan’s Securities and Exchange Commission allowed them in 1982, buybacks were treated as illegal stock manipulations in violation of the 1933 and 1934 Securities and Exchange Acts.
Yet they’re still stock manipulations. By using inside knowledge of when and how buybacks are scheduled, corporate executives can time when they exercise their own stock options—which now constitute most of their compensation—to reap maximum benefits for themselves.
Buybacks also impose a huge cost on the economy.
Every dollar spent lining the pockets of CEOs and investors is a dollar less to upgrade equipment and protect workers and the public.
Boeing failed to follow through with a promised $7 billion safety redesign of its 737 aircraft while it was spending roughly that much each year on stock buybacks.
Norfolk Southern Railroad paid investors $18 billion in buybacks and dividends over the five years before its equipment malfunctioned in the disastrous derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, which released over 300,000 gallons of toxic and flammable chemicals into the air and soil.
Abbott Labs spent $5 billion on stock buybacks while allowing plant conditions to deteriorate to the point where bacterial contamination of baby formula resulted in infant deaths and a nationwide formula shortage.
Money spent on buybacks also means less money for research and development, which hobbles American competitiveness at a time when China is breathing down our necks.
Apple now spends twice as much on stock buybacks as on R&D. Over the last fiscal year, Apple doled out $78 billion on buybacks.
Intel, the largest chip maker in America, with revenues last year of $54 billion, was recently awarded an $8.5 billion grant from the federal CHIPS and Science Act, plus $11 billion in subsidized loans.
But Intel fritters away its profits on stock buybacks. Its website proudly touts that it has spent $152 billion on stock buybacks since 1990.
There’s no way to be sure Intel isn’t using CHIPS money for stock buybacks. As Maryland Senator Chris Van Hollen noted: “While the legislation specifically prohibits the use of CHIPS funds for stock buybacks and dividend payments, these restrictions do not explicitly prohibit award recipients from using CHIPS funds to free up their own funds, which they can then use for those purposes.”
As if all this weren’t bad enough, stock buybacks provide an added incentive for companies to monopolize their industries and keep prices high.
A new Roosevelt Institute analysis found that the 10 largest publicly traded fast-food corporations spent $6.1 billion on buybacks last year. At the same time, they hiked prices to consumers. The average markup in the fast-food industry jumped 8.4% last year, while markups for firms across all industries grew 6.2%. Fast-food corporations lasts year charged prices 27% above the marginal cost of production.
According to Oxfam’s recent report, America’s 200 largest corporations are more profitable than ever. Net profits soared to $1.25 trillion in 2022, a 63% increase over 2018. But 90% of that sum was paid out to shareholders ($448 billion as dividends and a record $681 billion as stock buybacks).
And because CEO pay is linked to share prices, CEO pay is through the roof. The typical worker’s pay is higher than it was two years ago, adjusted for inflation, but it is still in the cellar.
In sum, the social costs of stock buybacks continue to surge.
What’s the answer to all this?
Ban stock buybacks—as they were banned before 1983.
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Norfolk Southern Agrees to Pay $600 Million—A Fraction of Its 2023 Profits—for East Palestine Disaster
The company reported nearly $3 billion in income from its railway operations last year.
Apr 09, 2024
A decision from a class-action lawsuit has determined Norfolk Southern will now have to pay $600 million—a mere fraction of the company’s 2023 profits—for the toxic derailment of its train in East Palestine, Ohio last year.
The decision deals with everyone within a 20-mile radius of the derailment. The train spilled more than a million pounds of hazardous chemicals in East Palestine.
"Individuals and businesses will be able to use compensation from the settlement in any manner they see fit to address potential adverse impacts from the derailment," the company said in a statement. "This could include healthcare needs and medical monitoring, property restoration and diminution, and compensation for any net business loss."
BREAKING: Norfolk Southern agrees to pay a $600 million settlement to the people of East Palestine more than a year after one of their trains derailed and spilled toxic chemicals into the community.https://t.co/tiQd2NXjnL
— More Perfect Union (@MorePerfectUS) April 9, 2024
"We believe this is a fair, reasonable and adequate result for the community on a number of levels, not the least of which is the speed of the resolution, and the overall amount of the awards residents can expect, which will be significant for those most impacted by the derailment," said Seth Katz of Burg Simpson Eldredge Hersh & Jardine, M. Elizabeth Graham of Grant & Eisenhofer, Jayne Conroy of Simmons Hanly Conroy and T. Michael Morgan of Morgan & Morgan, the attorneys for the plaintiffs, in a combined statement.
The Biden administration recently announced that at least two people will now have to be on board the trains of the country's largest freight operators, following the East Palestine disaster, which drew national attention to Norfolk Southern’s history of dangerous practices and lobbying against more stringent federal safety rules.
Last year, even after adjusting for a $1.1 billion hit associated with the East Palestine wreck, the company reported nearly $3 billion in income from its railway operations.
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