Teamsters International President Joe Peaden and Vice President Joe Biden were on hand at the Republican National Convention in 2016 to endorse Donald Trump's presidential campaign. Joe Biden was the first person to endorse a presidential candidate in the modern history of the union.
00:00:28.620I wondered, I sat and watched you in the stands at the RNC, and I don't think I've ever seen anybody give a speech at a convention, a very well-received speech, without endorsing the candidate.
00:00:40.740How did you convince Trump to do that?
00:00:42.840Well, I think Trump and I have a good relationship.
00:00:45.600We've got a mutual respect for each other.
00:01:17.000And, you know, I think he knew the struggles that we had with our membership.
00:01:22.660We've got 1.3 million members, so, you know, that membership is made up of Republican, Democrats, and independents.
00:01:28.760And, you know, we knew all along where our membership was trending, and we had to do a lot of polling and everything else.
00:01:35.540And we had a lot of communication during the campaign leading up to the RNC.
00:01:41.120So I think he knew the spot that we were in if we just came out and did a straight endorsement.
00:01:46.400But we really couldn't do that because our process, we interviewed every single candidate that from, you know, the people that entered the race early to the last two standing, which was Trump and Harris.
00:01:59.600And we interviewed them in a roundtable with rank-and-file members in our general executive board.
00:02:05.320And we provided each candidate with 16 of the same questions.
00:02:09.940And, you know, Trump was, you know, like all of them, they weren't strong on some of our issues, and no fault of their own, because I don't think deep down they understood what our actual issues are.
00:02:21.840But at the end of the day, I think he knew that by us representing, speaking at the RNC, representing the Teamsters Union, that he was actually showing America, the American workers, that, you know, he was for labor.
00:04:16.180And I think part of the thought process from the Republican side was, look, if we get the general president of the biggest, strongest union in the country,
00:04:27.300that's going to signal to every working person that how committed, you know, the Republican Party is, the opportunity the Republican Party has to prove that they want to represent American workers.
00:05:12.120Because the people that we were talking about, the corporate elitists and everybody else, those are the people that the Democrats have fallen in love with.
00:05:19.200Those are the people I serve instead of the middle class the way it used to be 50 years ago.
00:05:23.240So we know that we would have got tremendous pushback.
00:05:41.320But, you know, I'm going to call balls the strikes.
00:05:43.460You know, they haven't done shit for us.
00:05:44.680And when we didn't get invited, it's a funny story because two weeks prior to us speaking at the RNC, you know, we didn't hide from the fact that we were going to speak there.
00:05:55.220Listen, I tell everybody all the time, if I get a venue to highlight how valuable our organization is, the TeamCist Union, to the entire country, I will take any and all venues to do that.
00:06:04.420So two weeks prior to that, Chuck Schumer asked me to meet with him.
00:06:52.940When he said, you know, we fixed your pensions, that gave me an opportunity to say, you're the same guy in the same party that 40 years ago embraced, endorsed,
00:07:03.260and signed off on deregulation in the trucking industry, which we lost 400,000 jobs in 1980.
00:12:25.160But, you know, we're a real progressive union.
00:12:28.060We don't have all our eggs in one basket right now.
00:12:31.560We're trying to organize Amazon, which has about 400,000 employees, both direct and this DSP model that they masquerade as not being direct employees.
00:14:27.320I was always fascinated with the team says, you know, my dad was my best friend and I have an older brother and a younger brother and they're both in the team says union.
00:14:37.040But I was the one that always really liked trucks.
00:15:42.900But I wonder, I mean, one of the reasons I wanted to talk to you was, you know, well, for a lot of reasons, to get your political analysis, but also just that the life that you grew up in.
00:28:22.920I mean, the Boston that you grew up in, which I remember vividly, you know, so well, was really, it was an Irish city.
00:28:28.260I mean, no one would say it, but it's just a fact.
00:28:29.940It was like it was run by the Irish and had been since, like, the 1850s when they came in and took it over from the Yankees because they were better organizers and more intense.
00:28:51.120Yeah, I mean, you look at, you know, take a snapshot of Boston politics 10 years, 10 years ago and go back even further, like 30 years and see where we're at right now.
00:29:04.720It's a completely different landscape.
00:29:18.760You know, the priorities seem to have changed.
00:29:20.620And I think what changed in Boston, which is part of the problem that you see, is that no one from Boston that grew up in Boston or in the Boston area, like Medford, where I'm from, Everett, Somerville, no one in Cambridge, no one that grew up there can afford to live there.
00:29:41.100So, what you have is you have all these transients and these people from the suburbs and out of state that grew up in rural areas their whole life.
00:29:50.140They move in here and, you know, they're paying the high rents, they're paying the high costs, and they're basically controlling the narrative.
00:29:56.720And that narrative is not consistent with the Boston that I knew and that I grew up with.
00:30:01.960Boston was a blue-collar city that was very proud, very patriotic.
00:30:52.640The gentrification that Boston has seen over the last 10 years is crazy.
00:30:57.360If you went to South Boston 25 years ago, where I used to report to work every day in South Boston, and you took a snapshot of the waterfront, there was nothing down there.
00:31:07.560Matter of fact, 1995 or 96, I was working rank and fire.
00:31:11.840We were building a crane because they were getting ready to build a hotel right in the seaport, which wasn't the seaport.
00:31:25.660I mean, we'd back in our cars, our vehicles to go to work, and we'd have to look to make sure someone wasn't sleeping in the parking lot that you'd run over.
00:32:19.600And everybody should be able to have their own opinions on whatever those issues are.
00:32:23.820I mean, I think you and I probably have the same opinions on a lot of the social issues.
00:32:26.940But from what we do every day as representing working people and people in general is we want to make certain that people have the economic resources to buy a modest home,
00:32:41.400to afford tuition so that kids can go to school, and to plan for a very modest retirement that's not compromised by debt.
00:32:52.480And, unfortunately, the Boston politics or the Massachusetts politics have taken a road down this social justice warrior path where, you know, we're not so concerned with, you know, the people on Main Street.
00:33:08.180We want to make sure that we're fighting these social justice issues that do not put food on the table, do not keep gas prices normal, do not, you know, compromise people when they go into the grocery store.
00:33:20.560So, lots has changed, I think, as a result of this election.
00:33:24.140And, look, this election was a perfect example of it.
00:33:36.240Our members, who I know intimately, and, look, some of them don't agree with me, some of them don't agree with our policies, and that's the beauty of living in America, right?
00:33:46.500You can have disagreements, you can have, you know, difference of opinions, but by talking to our members, we knew the concerns were the prices at the gas pumps, the prices at the grocery stores, and the ability to afford a home and maintain and keep that home.
00:34:45.160And, you know, the Democratic Party, and I've been very critical of them, and I'm going to continue to be very critical of them because I think it's important that they listen for once.
00:34:59.060You know, instead of, when I have a conversation with you and I don't agree with you, my goal is to not get you to agree with me, but I want you to see that, because I have a difference of opinion, that it's not going to destroy a relationship.
00:35:13.200And there's going to be many issues that you and I may be able to embrace together and maybe make some change.
00:35:19.300This party, once you go against them, they get so vindictive, the party, the Democrats now are acting the way that they used to accuse the Republicans 20 and 30 years ago.
00:35:32.020And they basically become that Republican Party that they despised.
00:36:19.960And, you know, part of being an American is you should have the ability to listen to opinions and form your own and make your own decisions.
00:36:31.020That mainstream media has proven one thing.
00:38:05.120We want to interview the candidates, which we've never done before.
00:38:07.600And we asked every single candidate in January or December to come in and meet with us.
00:38:12.700The first person to respond was Donald Trump.
00:38:15.240I'll be in there, definitely, without a doubt.
00:38:16.860And all these other candidates, RFK right away, Asa Hutchinson, Cornel West, all of them, they came right in.
00:38:25.260Same format, same questioning like we talked about earlier.
00:38:27.980And the struggle was getting Biden in here.
00:38:31.800He didn't like the fact that Trump committed early, or the Democrats didn't like that he committed early.
00:38:36.960So, long story short, we go through this whole process, and we have Biden in there.
00:38:43.600And, you know, you could just clearly tell he was, you know, not the man he was.
00:38:47.660And it was kind of sad, you know, because it's sad because you look at it, and I think generally, you know, a nice older man, nice older gentleman, right?
00:38:58.440And what they were doing to him, the Democratic Party, it would kind of look like elderly abuse to me.
00:39:33.420And then when Biden drops out of the race, but prior to Biden dropping out of the race, he's in the race.
00:39:39.820Around June or May, one of my vice presidents, a woman named Joan Corey out of my local, she sits on our general executive board, was at an event with Vice President Harris.
00:39:53.140And, you know, they're going through the line to get the picture, and Joan introduces herself to Vice President Harris.
00:40:32.700Who does this fucking lady think she is?
00:40:35.000Like, if I want to support from any organization, I am not going to point my finger in someone's face and say, you better get on board or else.
00:40:46.400But that's the attitude of this whole party.
00:40:54.300She finally agrees to come after we were putting pressure on her, you know, basically, because I was doing interviews all over the place saying, we haven't got invited to the DNC.
00:41:03.640We, you know, they haven't accepted our invitation for her to come to a roundtable, so she comes to the roundtable.
00:42:58.420So you're meeting with the biggest labor organization that you want.
00:43:01.880And you've got an opportunity for media to question you about how you felt the media, how you felt the meeting went, and what you wanted to achieve.
00:43:09.860And you don't want to speak to the media.
00:43:27.240They don't realize that, and I've said this numerous times, when I'm talking to a member, whoever that member may be, regardless of race, religion, color, creed, I know that they give me the opportunity to represent them.
00:44:12.480If you were really, you know, passionate about putting up a candidate that could actually represent Democrats like they did or represent the party.
00:44:23.020Why weren't you developing a plan two and a half years ago because you thought you just had in the bag.
00:44:29.360You thought people were going to do what you tell them to do.
00:45:03.100If you're still using Verizon, AT&T, or T-Mobile, obviously our condolences, but you're going to want to hear this.
00:45:09.280Our cell phone company, Pure Talk, gives us the exact same service you're currently getting from those big companies, but for half the cost.
00:46:55.200But I'm just saying that whole world of organized, at least in your union, like just the people in it, you know, they were all Democrats, but they were never, they were all kind of traditional social.
00:47:06.500Look, they have families, like they care about pensions.
00:48:11.780And I don't support national right to work.
00:48:13.720And then we had a strike with a company in his state, Graybar.
00:48:18.640He went out and walked the picket line.
00:48:21.220And that strike was settled the next day.
00:48:23.980Now, I'm not saying because he walked the picket line, but he demonstrated that that's what he's willing to do because his constituency works there.
00:48:31.060Those are the people that he represents.
00:48:34.140And, you know, he's been great on our issues, you know.
00:48:36.540And I think the Republicans have a great opportunity right now to show working people that what they were saying during the election is going to hold true.
00:48:46.960And I think Trump proved early on when he actually listened to us and when we lobbied for Larry Chavez de Riemer to be the Labor Secretary.
00:48:58.480Now, you know, I don't think it was a popular decision from a lot of his donors that supported him.
00:49:03.880But, you know, I went down and I had a frank conversation with the president.
00:49:08.200I'm like, look, this is important to us.
00:49:10.720You know, if you truly want to show that you're going to, you know, embrace working people and work hard on their behalf, this is an early indicator that you're willing to do this.
00:50:18.960But I think there are a lot of Republicans, especially in the Senate, like Mitch McConnell, who just have not—well, Mitch McConnell is a really bad person, so he's a specific case.
00:50:30.160But there are, like, decent people who just haven't sort of made the mental change that they're not the party that they thought they were.
00:50:34.780Well, I think part of that problem is we haven't had the conversations with those folks either.
00:50:38.160Because there's been such a line drawn in the sand where if you were on one side or the other, especially in our world, Labor, if you're a Democrat, you shouldn't be talking to the Republicans.
00:50:56.120It's like, you know, if you're looking to truly collaborate and actually make things happen, you've got to talk to people that you normally wouldn't.
00:51:05.700You've got to express your ideals, your opinions.
00:52:52.960At some point, I would like to see somebody with power ask questions of the banks because if you want to know what hurts working people, it's debt and it's credit card debt, specifically 22%.
00:53:08.640And I think the fastest way to improve the lives of middle-class, working-class people is to address that in some way or at least have to begin the conversation.
00:53:18.800Like it's bad to hook people on 22% interest.
00:53:23.060Yeah, it's bad to hook people who depend upon keeping their electricity and their utilities on when they have to pay with a credit card at 22%.
00:53:31.000Because, again, the corporate greed, a lot of these CEOs at these banks, there's such a disparity between the people that are their customers and what the banks are making.
00:53:45.100There should be a platform to regulate these banks and make certain that everybody is playing, have a level playing field, like these credit card companies.
00:53:56.680Like you made a point earlier off the record.
00:53:58.600You said there should be a union for credit card, people that have credit cards, right?
00:54:15.040Well, imagine if we, to your point earlier, withheld our payments as a country to these credit card companies and these banks that obviously support these credit cards.
00:54:27.040What sent a pretty strong fucking message?
00:54:29.220Well, I've raised this before and been treated as like the Unabomber.
00:55:42.220Right, but credit cards especially, and the payday loan people have taken a lot of well-deserved abuse.
00:55:48.980I mean, clearly that's predatory, but I just—I remember when I was a kid, my father was a reporter, covered the mafia, and they—I remember very well hearing from him that they put people in prison for loan sharking.
00:55:58.320You know, all the time, put the mafia in prison for loan sharking.
00:56:02.900I don't think they were loaning at 22 percent.
00:56:04.760They probably had better rates than the banks, like credit cards, definitely.
00:56:08.240And by the way, they paid out on the lotto in full, unlike the state governments, which pay you, like, a percentage of it.
00:56:14.100They're more crooked than the mafia, and no one says a word.
00:56:22.120I liked Josh Hawley had a nice Senate hearing where, you know, he brought them to task.
00:56:29.380He brought the credit card companies to task, and, you know, it seems like you get punished for being, you know, the misfortunes you may endure in life.
00:56:37.560So the credit cards, too, the other thing I don't like about them is, you know, if you got a good credit rating and you're, you know, you've been fortunate enough to have a good job, you get a lesser rate, right?
00:56:48.160If I have bad credit and I've got a lot of debt, I'm getting that higher rate.
00:58:05.580It needs to not be a weapon against working people.
00:58:09.940Technology is common, fast, and fair, especially in many of the industries that we represent.
00:58:15.960But, again, these are conversations that need to be had before AI is implemented and or dispersed into the workplace.
00:58:25.880There's a lot of jobs that can be created as a result of technology, as a result of implementation of AI.
00:58:32.380And, again, it's people drawing a line in the sand, not want to have these conversations.
00:58:38.720The general public or the general perception of the world is they want convenience, they want less labor, but it's not good for the country.
00:58:49.440And automation is going to be just as debilitating to working people than – it's just like AI.
00:58:57.880And what we've done is we've negotiated contracts where automation has to be negotiated in the industries we work.
00:59:06.180If they're going to make a technological change or they're going to automate something, they've got to maintain the job levels and create jobs moving forward as a result of this technology.
00:59:15.140You take grocery warehouses where they're having robots pick orders.
00:59:19.880Well, we've been able to negotiate contracts where we create jobs, we maintain the robots, we program the robots.
00:59:26.060You know, we fix the robots, we build the robots in some of these cases.
00:59:32.220United Postal Service, 340,000 members, technology plays a big role in the forwarding of packages and envelopes.
00:59:39.560And, you know, obviously it's efficient, but there are jobs created as a result of it.
00:59:44.900And that's what the beauty about being in a union is.
00:59:47.500But I think people underestimate how technology is going to destroy this country if we don't regulate it, if we don't get in front of it, if we don't create jobs as a result of it.
00:59:58.840I mean, we're dummying down this society so much.
01:00:02.400It's, you know, you've got college students not doing research papers.
01:00:37.140But why shouldn't, if there's like electricity or any emergent technology, electricity shows up 100 years ago, it's fair to ask, you know, clearly it provides light and, you know, powers machines.
01:01:05.000That was technology involving, but we always protected the jobs, right?
01:01:09.260We always made sure that those jobs are protected.
01:01:11.960And that was technology back then, right?
01:01:15.240Gavin Newsom in California should be the poster child for bad behavior when it comes to protecting against AI and technology.
01:01:24.480He's the same guy that working people through the recall election saved him, right?
01:01:33.060But he's the same guy that when you work a bipartisan bill to protect against technology, AI, and also mandate autonomous vehicles to have a human operator, which is bipartisan, gets on his desk, first order of business, is he vetoes it.
01:01:50.340Because he's looking for his next best opportunity with the captors he fell in love with, technology, tech companies, Google, Uber, whatever else, Lyft, all those companies he's bought and paid for.
01:02:04.400So, he doesn't care about how that affects people's jobs.
01:02:07.640He doesn't care about how it affects the community.
01:02:31.980So, they had a strike, two-day strike.
01:02:34.400And it was over wages, two issues, wages, and automation, which is AI.
01:02:42.040And they used the ports in China to demonstrate how efficient it is by using robots and artificial intelligence.
01:02:51.720The one good thing was that President Trump met with the longshoremen because they've got a cooling-off period until January 15th.
01:02:59.560And then they'll go back into negotiations to negotiate the AI and the automation, which I think they're going to be successful in maintaining their jobs.
01:03:09.220But President Trump came on and said, I've been studying automation.
01:03:12.680I've been studying AI for a long time.
01:03:14.380And I don't believe anybody should be losing their jobs over that.
01:03:18.720So, I think to your point, I haven't had a conversation with that man.
01:03:21.840I'd love to, just to express how important it is to have conversations with people that actually perform jobs that could be replaced by technology or AI.
01:03:32.800Because that may give a different perspective where we can collaborate and actually create more jobs as a result of it.
01:04:36.800Well, your son or daughter may be affected by this or your neighbor or a relative.
01:04:41.880You should get engaged and protect the integrity of this country, not just go along to get along because that's where we're going wrong in this country.
01:04:49.900You know, the attitude is, oh, they can just do it.
01:05:12.160A year after having an abortion, women overall had a 50% higher chance of needing psychiatric treatment and an 87% higher likelihood of personality and behavioral disorders.
01:12:24.980And, you know, he has to understand that he's not dealing with an organization that's going to go away.
01:12:32.540We might not have the money that he has, but we definitely have one thing.
01:12:35.660We've got the workers on our side and we've got intestinal fortitude and courage and conviction to take on the fight.
01:12:41.460So do you have any idea what percentage of Amazon workers use federal social services to supplement their income?
01:12:48.380Well, I would say the majority of them.
01:12:50.560I don't have that statistic, but, you know, the part-timers I know that I've talked to, especially in the New York area, they're all in subsidized housing.
01:13:17.060Where an organization like mine would demand, like we do with UPS, like we do with DHL, like we do with every other employer, that they not only pay a respectful wage, but they also give them free health care.
01:13:29.300They give them a career path to a retirement.
01:13:32.320You know, and people that hit that send button don't realize that not only are they paying for the delivery and the product, they're also paying for, you know, Jeff Bezos' white-collar crime syndicate of tax evasion and evading his obligation.
01:14:20.740But the one thing that was certain, whether you were, you know, delivering packages or sorting and loading packages on a truck, whether you were in a grocery warehouse, whether you were working for a health care company,
01:14:31.240our members went out every single day providing goods and services to this country with total disregard for their safety, the safety of their families.
01:14:51.120Everybody was saying, oh, the American worker, the Teamsters, they're heroes.
01:14:54.480Well, when these companies are making record profits during the pandemic and it comes time to reward our members, their employees, all of a sudden we're zeros.
01:15:04.580So we've been reminding corporate America how important the Teamsters union are, but more importantly, the American worker, especially through a crisis.
01:15:12.440Because, you know, like you said earlier, you know, you talk about Irish and Italians.
01:15:18.180You know, I think corporate America has what they call Irish Alzheimer's, you know.
01:15:22.160They forget the people that provide them the most, but they never forget when they get fucked on a dollar, right?
01:15:28.080So, you know, I think, you know, the Teamsters union, yeah, we do have the best workforce in the country.
01:15:33.600We're well-trained, we're safety conscious, but, you know, we fight hard for our members.
01:15:38.980Are the, I don't want to be vulgar or anything like that, but is it true what they say about UPS drivers being like the most desired men in the world?