On the Hill This Week: Labor Secretary, Green New Deal
Labor Secretary: The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee held a confirmation hearing for Julie Su. The entire labor movement supports her confirmation and AFA sent a letter of support to the Committee before the hearing: “Julie Su is the most qualified candidate for this office since Frances Perkins. Serving 17 years as a civil rights attorney representing workers who are often invisible...We need a Labor Secretary who has a proven record of fighting for workers and defending our rights."
Su is currently Deputy Labor Secretary. Working people need a confirmed Labor Secretary to ensure our rights on the job are defended.
Green New Deal: U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Ed Markey on Thursday reintroduced the Green New Deal Resolution, backed by climate, health, and labor groups. Climate change is already having a direct effect on our jobs and lives. “The issues with climate change are destroying our jobs right now,” said Sara Nelson, AFA President. “As Flight Attendants' homes are destroyed in natural disasters; as airports are picked apart and we can’t land planes or takeoff; as we recover our communities and bring them back.The solutions to climate change are what give us the opportunity to build up a new economy from the ground up with a real just transition, that is worker centered.”
- More Turbulence, More Risk at Work: Research in recent years has pointed to more incidents of clear-air turbulence in the jet stream brought on by rising temperatures. Flight Attendants and passengers are feeling the effects firsthand. From 2009 to 2022, the National Transportation Safety Board tallied 163 "serious injuries" resulting from turbulence. The types of injuries tracked include major fractures, serious burns, internal bleeding or any other injury requiring two or more days of hospitalization. Flight crews incurred 80% of all such injuries, the NTSB notes.
- Airports Closed, Lost Hours: Recently, intense, sudden flooding closed the Fort Lauderdale Airport for two days. The severity of storms, hurricanes, tornadoes, and snowstorms have forced airports and airlines to halt operations at increasing frequencies and duration.
