Newark Airport Workers Plan To Strike, Will Join Others Nationwide

Around 100 Newark airport employees with the 32BJ chapter of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) are threatening to strike on Wednesday night over low wages and better working conditions.

The employees - who clean United Airlines planes for subcontractor PrimeFlight Aviation Services – stated that they plan to walk off the job at 9 p.m. and form a picket line outside of the airport’s Terminal C, a union spokesman told NorthJersey.com.

In addition to the action at Newark Airport, SEIU members are also planning strikes at LaGuardia Airport, Kennedy International Airport , and airports in Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago and Fort Lauderdale.

It is unclear how long the proposed strike might last, or the effect that it might have on airport operations, NorthJersey.com reported.

As of Wednesday at 6 p.m., United Airlines had cancelled arriving flights from Shanghai, Chicago, Winston Salem and Austin.

The airline had also cancelled departing flights from Chicago, Orlando, Macon and Providence.

32BJ SEIU members released the following statement about the planned strike, according to the Bergen Dispatch:

“While airlines across the country have been making record profits, the airport workers who make these profits possible are struggling to survive in jobs that pay poverty wages, provide little to no affordable health care, and few paid days off. Various studies have shown that these working conditions can directly affect airport worker’s families and their communities. Like fast food workers, who they have supported during similar national strikes, airport workers have been organizing for the past three years and have committed to do whatever it takes to win $15 and union rights. As airport workers have been organizing for better lives, many of the subcontractors they work for have committed health and safety violations and many of their demands for better treatment have been met with illegal repression.

“To expose the illegal treatment that they are forced to endure at our nation’s airports, thousands of airport workers across the country have decided to go on strike.

“In Newark, airport workers are striking to protest against unfair labor practices by their employer PrimeFlight Aviation Services. At each airport, striking airport workers are taking action against individual yet similar illegal practices, the last straw after years of poverty wages, few benefits and subpar working conditions.”

One worker at Newark Airport, Demetrius DeBaise, started an online petition to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey – which operates Newark Liberty, JFK and LaGuardia – to raise wages.

“Every day I lift overweight bags for hours on end for just $8.25 an hour… The stress of trying to provide for my family on so little income has nearly broken me.”

See his petition here.