World Socialists Warn of “Ballot Fraud”…

… in the “White House-brokered deal reached two weeks ago to avert a national rail strike.â€

Last week, former SMART-TD public relations director Frank Wilner raised the possibility that the unions could simply ignore a “no†vote and impose the deal unilaterally. This could be done either through a constitutional loophole, or by sending the contract to binding arbitration, where it can be enforced without a vote. Wilner cited the precedent set by the United Transportation Union (the precursor to SMART-TD) in 1996, when it did the latter.

Workers have ample reason to suspect that the union bureaucracy will engage in foul play. “With the last agreement, the way they counted the votes, a ‘no’ vote is a no, a ‘yes’ vote is a yes, but whoever did not call in and vote, they counted that ‘vote’ as a ‘yes’ vote,†the veteran yard worker told the WSWS. “They rig the vote and that’s how they get these agreements to pass. After every agreement we look at each other like, ‘I voted no and everyone I know voted no. How did this thing pass?’â€

Earlier this month, District 19 of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) announced that its members had rejected its agreement by a margin of more than 60 percent. A worker told the WSWS that when he examined the final vote tally, he found something strange. According to the IAM, Lodge 1112 cast only a single vote, out of 274 dues-paying machinists. Considering the overwhelming opposition to the contract, this result is hardly credible.

TOM HALL, ERIK SCHREIBER, JACOB CROSSE WRITING FOR THE WORLD SOCIALIST WEB SITE

Click on link for more from the article: How the rail unions plan to ram through their sellout contracts – World Socialist Web Site (wsws.org)