Thank you so much, President Renfroe!
Good AFTERNOON, Letter Carriers!! Brothers, sisters, siblings—how’s everybody doing?
NOW…I wanna get to all the incredible work you all have been doing…but can I just say first: What a year the past two weeks have been.
I’ve been in the labor movement for a little while now. A few years; I won’t say how many. But the honest truth is: I’ve never seen a moment like this.
How many of you have spent the past two weeks like I have? Every day…your phone blows up with some game-changing political news we haven’t seen in like a century.
And to come out of all of that…with this energy, this enthusiasm…I’ve never seen anything like that, either.
It’s about beating Donald Trump…but it’s about something a whole lot more, too. It’s about people recognizing the power we have when we come together.
People in this country are seeing unions in a new light.
They’re fed up with the way things have been going. Do you hear it? I hear it every single day.
My paycheck doesn’t go as far as it used to. My rent is *out of control.* I worry whether I’m still gonna have a job in a few years. I don’t feel *good* about my future.
Workers have been living on the edge.
Does it make sense to anyone in this room…that the richest people in this country have seen their wealth go up by $1.8 TRILLION—trillion with a T—while workers struggle to put food on the table?
Does it make sense to anyone in this room…that Jeff Bezos makes in seven seconds what an Amazon warehouse worker makes in a year? That he has enough money to rocket himself into space…while half this country lives paycheck to paycheck?
But if you look around right now…something absolutely amazing is happening.
All over this country…workers are reclaiming their power.
Workers are realizing: There *is* a way to fight back.
And it’s not complicated. It’s the exact same way we got the five-day work week…and the eight-hour workday…and sick leave and paid family leave, and vacation time.
It’s the exact same way letter carriers back in 1970…in New York, and right here in New England, and then all over the country…STOOD UP against Nixon, and Congress, and poverty wages.
We fight back TOGETHER. We fight back IN A UNION.
NO ONE knows that better than this incredible leadership team you have.
Your President, Brian Renfroe—who is fearless and personifies where this labor movement *is* and where we’re *going,* into the Deep South, and leaving no worker behind.
I’m in awe of NALC’s 93% voluntary membership, which is one of the best organized in the entire country!
NALC and its leadership team have been at the forefront—through a pandemic, through reform battles, through political attacks.
It hasn’t been easy for one second, has it?
But day after day after day…this country keeps moving because of you.
Because a grandparent gets the life-saving medication they need. Because that five-year-old gets the birthday card that means so much to them.
Because you check in on those older folks…who may not have anyone else around.
Because when it came time to vote in the middle of a pandemic…Americans knew they could trust you.
This country does not work without you!
And it’s about damn time our leaders recognized that.
It’s TIME…to make sure every letter carrier in this country has the dignity and respect they deserve.
It’s TIME…to pass the Protect Our Letter Carriers Act—so no letter carrier in this country has to walk down the street afraid they’re gonna be harassed, or attacked.
It’s TIME…for the fair pension valuation method—not just so our letter carriers retire with the dignity they deserve…but so our entire postal network is strong for decades and decades to come.
And I promise you: I’ll do everything we can to make sure that is front-and-center on the Biden Administration agenda in the time they have left!
NOW…we *need* to keep pushing ourselves.
Because those forces that want to drag us backwards…they’re not going away. Three months—that’s it—until the most important election in our lifetimes.
An election where our letter carriers are gonna play such an important role.
An election that’s gonna singlehandedly determine so much of what our future looks like.
Wherever I go I hear workers tell me:
Don’t tell me *who* to vote for.
Just give me the facts. No B.S.
So I’m gonna deliver a few facts—just like our letter carriers do every day.
It’s a FACT…that Donald Trump sold us down the river for four years—so his billionaire friends could get even richer.
It’s a FACT…that he called our Postal Service “a joke” in the middle of the pandemic. That he insulted every letter carrier who put their life on the line to keep service going.
It’s a FACT…that he claimed “mass fraud” in vote-by-mail—because he cannot stand that we beat him!
THOSE are facts.
And here’s a few more.
Have many of you have been hearing about Project 2025? And let me correct myself: How many of you have been hearing about DONALD TRUMP’s Project 2025, okay?
Because as hard as he tries to run from this…he OWNS this agenda. This is the blueprint for his second term. Heritage Foundation 100 + former Trump staff.
And as hard as that blueprint hits all of us…we all know: It’s our public sector brothers, and sisters, and siblings that we’ve gotta protect the most.
Public-sector bargaining…OUTLAWED.
No more public-sector unions…PERIOD.
Retirement plans of federal workers…SLASHED.
Protections for our LGBTQ+ family…GONE.
Hundreds of thousands of dedicated public servants…replaced with Donald Trump loyalists.
No protection for our right to bargain, our right to strike. It would be the end of the labor movement as we know it.
If you wrote that stuff into a movie script…they’d turn you away for being too extreme.
But that’s what we’re up against. And it’s on all of us to spread the word—to talk about Trump’s 2025 to our friends, and neighbors in everyday language…and let them know why this is so important.
And we can let them know the *good* news, too.
We have a champion who’s gonna stop that story from coming to pass. Her name is Vice President Kamala Harris.
Kamala Harris walked our picket lines back in 2019…when JD Vance was still giving TedTalks to billionaires at the Aspen Institute and Donald Trump was crossing a picket line.
Kamala Harris has been instrumental in this historic record we’ve achieved over the past three-and-a-half years.
Kamala Harris has made it clear she believes in our public-sector workers, our civil servants and our unions.
And we believe in her.
I’ll tell you one story as I close out.
Back in 2021, when our former president and our brother, Rich Trumka passed…we found ourselves in our own really difficult moment of transition. I was sitting there, still grappling with everything…and my phone rang. It was Kamala Harris. She called to offer support…and to me personally, knowing how hard it would be to lead while grieving.
She was compassionate, she was kind.
But most of all…she talked about having our back. And how sometimes, just by chance, we find ourselves in these historic moments—and how we have to be there for each other…she showed up unannounced for Rich’s viewing at our headquarters to comfort us.
Two weeks ago…that call came full circle. The Vice President called that Sunday, July 21 when the news became official. We talked about Joe Biden and what he meant to us. And she told me, really simply: She’s ready to keep fighting for our unions and our workers. And I said, you had our back through crisis, and we have yours!
So what I need to know right now is…are you ready to make HISTORY?
Are you ready to do what we do best…and ORGANIZE?
Are you all ready to send the first WORKING WOMAN to the White House? Let’s go get it done!! Thank you!!
