Rail workers shut down the Long Island Rail Road early Saturday morning, leaving Long Island commuters with the kind of travel problem that ruins workdays before they even begin.
About 3,500 workers represented by the five unions walked off the job after contract talks with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority failed. For the first time in 32 years, service was stopped across the busiest commuter rail system in North America. Nearly 300,000 daily riders suddenly had to hunt for another way to travel.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul acted quickly, but not towards accountability, blaming, wait for it, the Trump administration for ending mediation talks and pushing both sides closer to a strike. OANN shared Hochul’s statement.
Hochul (D-N.Y.) made a statement on Saturday praising her own investments in the LIRR, which she claimed is “more stable now than it has been for generations.” She condemned the unions’ demands and strike, as well as Trump’s alleged involvement.
“The disruption that Long Islanders face starting tonight is the direct result of reckless actions by the Trump Administration to cut mediation short and push these negotiations toward a strike,” she stated.
Unsurprisingly, President Donald Trump fired back and said that Hochul knew he had nothing to do with the dispute, saying the failure was her leadership after nearly five years in office.
Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, who’s also running for governor as a Republican, called Hochul the worst governor in America and said she failed to do her job before the shutdown arrived.
As for the title of worst governor in America, I don’t know, but with the Marxist in Virginia and the hair gel in California, she’s at least in the top three.
New York Democrats held power in Albany long before Trump returned to the White House. Hochul has served as governor since 2021; Democrats control the governor’s office, the state Senate, and the state Assembly.
Contract talks dragged on for three years, and the MTA, led by Chair and CEO Janno Lieber, still couldn’t land a deal before workers hit the picket line.
Mark Wallace, president of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, said the strike wouldn’t have happened if the MTA and the LIRR had accepted the terms recommended by federal mediators.
Reuters laid the union’s position right on the line.
“This strike would not have happened if the MTA and LIRR offered our members the reasonable terms the government recommended multiple times,” Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen President Mark Wallace said.
“We hope LIRR gets serious soon to avoid further unnecessary disruptions for hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers. They know where to find us when they’re ready: on the streets.”
Nick Peluso, national vice president for the striking Transportation Communications Union, said that the offers differed by roughly a 1% difference in wages, according to the Associated Press.
The MTA’s website said its leaders would continue to negotiate with the unions to resolve the strike.
The agency asked commuters to work from home when possible, and said the shutdown would cause severe congestion and delays.
It will provide limited shuttle buses on weekdays for essential workers and those who cannot work from home.
“For weeks, the MTA has attempted to negotiate in good faith and put multiple fair offers on the table that included meaningful wage increases, but you cannot make a deal if one side refuses to engage in good faith,” New York Governor Kathy Hochul said in a statement.
Hochul, who is seeking re-election later this year, urged the parties to return to the bargaining table.
Lieber defended the offer and argued that it gave unions the pay they wanted without wrecking the agency’s budget.
Commuters now get the bill for political failure; essential workers must scramble for limited shuttle buses; office workers face jammed roads or forced work-from-home arrangements; union members lose paychecks while they picket; restaurants, stores, event venues, and families all absorb the drag from a transit system that simply stopped.
New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli warned that the shutdown could cost up to $61 million per day in lost economic activity, which means the excuses now come with a price tag.
The pattern has become painfully familiar; when problems arise under Democratic governance, the explanation somehow wanders toward Trump. Crime, prices, border chaos, campus unrest, foreign policy, the Mets can’t buy a hit, and now a New York rail strike all get shoved into the same blame blanket.
Hochul didn’t inherit a one-day labor dispute from Washington; she watched a three-year contract fight roll toward the cliff and then complained about who stood nearby when it went over.
Long Island riders, and for that matter Americans in general, don’t need another press statement dressed up as leadership; they need trains.
Working families deserve straight answers from the people who run the state, fund the system, appoint leadership, negotiate contracts, and collect the fares.
Trump offered to step in and help get results if Hochul couldn’t handle the job. Whether she takes the offer or not, the strike has already shown how quickly excuses move when the trains don’t.
New York’s rail strike shows how quickly bad leadership reaches for a familiar target instead of resolving the problem in front of everyone. Working families don’t need another lecture while trains sit idle. Join PJ Media VIP today and use promo code FIGHT for 60% off your subscription.
