The agenda for the third and final day of the 2026 Sixth Quadrennial BMWED National Division Convention featured detailed reports on the Brotherhood’s recent work on hot-button issues like the proposed Union Pacific-Norfolk Southern merger and the battle around automated track inspection.

Brother Zachary Wood, BMWED Director of Strategic Coordination and Research, gave a thorough account of our work so far concerning the largest proposed merger of freight railroads ever – the first coast-to-coast freight railroad totaling 50,000 route miles across 43 states – and our rationale for standing opposed to it.

When Union Pacific CEO Jim Vena announced last year that any Unionized railroader would have a “guaranteed job” upon the completion of his proposed merger, Director Wood explained that our Union investigated this “promise.” What we quickly found, and what we have only grown more assured of, is that this statement was hollow. A good sound bite for a press conference, but insincere when compared to reality.

“There was no written agreement. No enforceable protection. No defined process for how those so-called guaranteed jobs would be protected, where those jobs would be located, what would happen if work was shifted, consolidated, sold, leased or transferred or whether those employees would be protected under terms strong enough to survive the actual transaction,” Director Wood said. “For Wall Street investors, the announcement was an attractive headline. For BMWED, it was a call to action.”

Together with our partners in the Teamster Rail Conference, the BLET, we were the first labor organization to sit down with U.P. following the merger announcement. We quickly learned that CEO Vena’s proposed “job for life” guarantee contained too many contractual holes and too little protection for our members. Other labor organizations took him up on the flimsy promise, but we stood firm in demanding more substance for BMWED and BLET support.

“Here is a detail the Carrier did not put in their press release,” Brother Wood told the delegation. “Their ‘jobs for life’ commitment does not take effect until the ink is dry on final approval. Until then both railroads can furlough freely while the STB reviews the application.”

He added: “The Teamsters Rail Conference is demanding protections that begin the day the STB accepted the application and go beyond the statutory minimums required under New York Dock. A commitment that starts at the finish line is not a commitment.”

Since that initial meeting, we have gone to Wall Street and meet with consequential business leaders, investors and bankers, the likes of UBS, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Susquehanna and Goldman Sachs. Our message was blunt.

We made it clear that a rail merger of this size cannot be judged only by what it may do for shareholders in the next quarter. Without real enforceable protections for the people who inspect, maintain and operate this railroad, this transaction creates an immediate threat to the American supply chain, to consumers and to national defense.

A weakened rail network does not just affect railroad workers. It affects chemical producers, energy markets, agriculture, manufacturers, ports, military readiness and every community that depends on rail service to be safe and efficient.

We also told the financial community that too much power concentrated in one rail carrier creates risks that do not stay inside the railroad industry.

Those risks spread into other investments into other sectors of the economy and eventually onto the American taxpayer. When the railroads cut too deep defer too much and centralize too much control the public will be left holding the bag when the system fails.

Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern are asking federal regulators to approve a transaction that touches every piece of the American economy: shippers, farmers, chemical producers, energy companies, manufacturers and the communities that depend on safe, reliable, competitive freight rail.

The Teamsters Rail Conference began reaching out to groups we do not always agree with.

Normally, organized labor, shippers and competing railroads are on different sides of the table. On this single issue, we find ourselves looking at the same problem. Those conversations led to the formation

of the Stop the Rail Merger Coalition.

That coalition includes labor organizations, shipper groups, agricultural interests, manufacturing and energy stakeholders, and Union Pacific’s competitor railroads.

It exists for one purpose: to stop a merger that creates a monopolistic threat to workers, customers, communities and the American supply chain.

In closing, Director Wood was pointed in his remarks.

“BMWED members should have confidence not just in our opposition, but in our approach,” he said. “This is not resistance for its own sake. This is strategic work, done through the right channels, with the right partners, at every level of the process.”

On the automated track inspection front, Brother A.J. Bastedo addressed the assembled delegates to provide a status update. Brother Bastedo has been brought on by National Division to work alongside Director of Safety Roy Morrison to confront this ongoing issue.

Since just before May 1st of last year, when the Association of American Railroads submitted its petition to reduce required visual track inspections, the membership of this union has been fighting back, Brother Bastedo told the group.

“And I want to be very clear about something,” he said. “The reason we were able to push back against this proposal was not because of lawyers, consultants, or lobbyists. It was because of railroaders. It was because of you. And today, the data is proving you were right.”

As new ATI data is becoming available from the initial FRA waivers granted to the freights, we are learning what we suspected was true. Human inspectors continue to find thousands of defects and identify conditions after ATI equipment has already passed through the territory.

Overwhelmingly, the majority of defects continue to be found by railroaders on the ground – not by machines.

“And most importantly,” Brother Bastedo said, “they've shown the public, and hopefully regulators and legislators what the men and women in this room already knew:

Technology can help us. Technology can provide another tool. Technology can improve efficiency.  But technology is not a replacement for trained railroaders. It never has been. And it never will be.”

Other things of note from Day 3 of the convention were recognitions of many soon-to-be retiring members of National Division:  Vice President Staci Moody-Gilbert, Director of Government Affairs Jeff Joines, and Sister Sonia Pettaway, Office Coordinator and Assistant in our Legislative Office.

“Sister Staci broke the glass ceiling of this Brotherhood, becoming the first woman General Chairperson and first National Division Vice President,” BMWED President Tony Cardwell said. “She is one of the hardest working and most compassionate people I have ever met. She started the Veterans Caucus and has taken the Diversity Committee to new heights. She has been a great help and support to me.”

On the departing Director Joines, President Cardwell gave high regards.

“I would argue that Brother Jeff is one of the greatest men who has ever served this Brotherhood,” he said. “After P.E.B. 250, I had just started in this position and Jeff was a rock that I depended on daily. I could easily say not a single person in this room would have sick leave without him.”

“Sister Pettaway is our secret, behind-the-scenes workhorse, who sets up all the meetings and does all the legwork in our Washington, D.C. office,” President Cardwell said. “Jeff, I love you brother, but Sonia’s the brains!”

Today culminates a fantastic week of Brotherhood and solidarity. In all, it was a great example of railroaders coming together to plan for the future and proceed forward doing the important work of our storied Union.