The Daily - A Coal Miner’s Political Transformation

Episode Date: August 22, 2022

For more than 500 days, coal miners in rural Alabama have been on strike. Around 900 workers walked off the job in April 2021, and they haven’t been back since.As the strike drags on, the miners are discovering that neither political party is willing to fight for them.For Braxton Wright, 39, a second-generation coal miner and, until recently, a Republican, the experience has altered his view of American politics.Guest: Michael Corkery, a business reporter for The New York Times.Background reading: To make ends meet, some striking coal miners in Alabama have picked up work at an Amazon warehouse. It’s the same one where workers have tried to unionize.For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

In case you're coming to the party late, and I don't know who that might be, but we do have some reporters in the crowd all the way from New York, from what I hear, and other places far and near. Give yourself a U.N. O.K. U.N. O.K. U.N.

O.K. From the New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. For more than 500 days, coal miners in rural Alabama have been on strike in one of the longest work stoppages in American history. The difference between us and the people who are keeping us out here who don't want to give us a free contract is one.

We're the ones that gave them the right to be billionaires. But as the strike drags on, the miners are discovering that neither political party is willing to fight for them. I can see some light. For the first time, I can see some light. Today, my colleague Michael Corkery has the story of one coal miner and how the strike

has transformed his view of American politics. You have proven once again that you belong to the fightinest, toughest, longstanding union in the history of man, the United Mind Workers of America, and I am so proud of you.

It's Monday, August 22nd. Michael, tell me about this strike. This strike is arguably the biggest labor story in the country, and yet it's getting very little attention. Just to give you a sense of the scale, there's about 900 coal miners who walked off the job in April 2021, and they haven't been back since. Wow. It's rare that people are willing in this day and age to leave their job and take a risk and go on strike.

But to go on strike for more than a year, I mean, more than 500 days, that's just unheard of. So I decided to go down there and talk to the workers and try to understand exactly what had made them take to the picket lines and to stay out there for so long. So who did you end up speaking with in alabama at the strike this company isn't treating us fairly that's the bottom line that's all you can say i spoke to coal miners of every type grandfathers my father retired from the union my uncle is retired from the Union. My uncle was retired from the Union. Miners that had been there for generations. Miners of different ages, races, backgrounds.

I lost about $20,000 a year on just my W-2 alone. Wow. That's $20,000 a year. And they all had different stories to tell, but many things in common, which was their commitment to staying on strike until they felt they were going to get a fair deal. We gave up some things and water for us to get them back where they're supposed to be. And now it's time for them to give back.

I wish they would spend one week underground with us. And I think it wouldn't take but two days of that one week for them to understand what bargaining in good faith should be. Definitely going to cross the line and go back to work. We'll stay in the fight. The day is coming. We're going to be back in that coal mine. And we're going to be getting what we're supposed to have.

So that's what this is all about. And one of the people that I ended up spending a lot of time with was a coal mine worker named Braxton Wright. Oh, yeah, you got to... Yeah, you want to go ride around? Sure, yeah, yeah. We can take my truck. Oh, great.

I know I can tell. Yeah, I can tell from the rocks. So Braxton's 39 years old. He grew up in this part of central Alabama, and he has settled and raised a family here. And when I was in Alabama, he took me on a tour of where he lives. Does that help you quit the... Indian?

Yeah. Do you have a flavor that you like? This one's called Melon Time. Melon Time. I don't know what kind of melon it is, but it actually tastes pretty decent. And it don't make me stink. Braxton's been a miner for many, many years. And his experience at the mine and just growing up in that part of Alabama

really helped me understand what this fight at the mine, what this strike was really all about. This seam is this, it's a coal seam that I guess this is just... Yeah, Blue Creek coal seam is what we mine. Yeah. But Blue Creek is supposed to be one of the best coal, or I guess we're really like the second best coal in the world. We're about 40 minutes away from Birmingham,

which is a few towns away from the coal mine where Braxton works. One of the coal companies back then was called Roden Coal, R-O-D-E-N. Every once in a while, you type in Roden Coal Company, it pulls up some pictures, and a lot of the pictures are from West Waltham. Hmm, huh. And all these towns around here spring up because of coal. They were basically extensions of the coal companies, as Braxton later explained. The town I live in, West Blockton, is actually a coal mining town.

It got its name from, they claimed they found a block of coal that weighed a ton, so they named it Blockton. And then when Blockton burned down, they moved it just west of Blockton, so then it became West Blockton. And so, like many other people in his community, a couple of years after he graduates high school, Braxton entered the coal industry. When I went to the coal mines, they started me out at $18 an hour, and I was working 48 hours a week. And a lot of the times I could work up to 60 hours if I wanted to, you know, so I was 21 years old and I went from making probably 33, 34,000 a year to making like 60,000 a year, you know, with the overtime. So that's a pretty good job for, you know, for a guy your age and, and, and, you know, we a guy your age and, you know, rural Alabama.

Yeah, it is. I mean, yeah. It's 2005. He is at this coal mining company called Jim Walter Resources. When me and my wife got married is when I decided I wanted a career instead of, you know, I guess she settled me down. You know, I was running wild until I met her. That's when I decided I wanted to make a full career out of it. And that's when I started working even harder to try to, you know, move up in the company.

And so Braxton sees himself spending his life in this company, making a great living. And what is the state of the mining industry when he enters it in 2005? Well, coal is in decline. The United States is no longer using it as its primary energy source and is transitioning to greener energy sources. Braxton's coal mine produces coal not for energy, but for steelmaking. And the American steel industry at that time is also in decline because much of it's being manufactured in China. So overall, the industry is troubled when he starts, and yet he's still being paid very, very well and making for people in central Alabama an enormous amount of money.

And the reason for that is pretty simple. In Washington, the coal operators and the miners' chiefs, led by John L. Lewis, meet to sign a contract ending nine months' turmoil in the coal fields. The coal miners are part of an extremely powerful union, the United Mine Workers of America, one of the oldest, most storied labor unions in history. The United Mine Workers of America has again accomplished the impossible. They have again negotiated an agreement against the greatest concentrated opposition that ever faced a labor union or a voluntary association of workmen. And they are quite militant.

They don't back down. And as a result of that, they've been able to gain very high wages and good benefits for their workers over time. We have made new gains. We have benefited all labor. And we have benefited all citizens who live under our flag. You know, coal mining, which you often do with only a high school education, offers quite a comfortable middle-class life. Many miners own their homes, multiple cars, send their kids to college, and a lot of that is attributed to the mine workers' union.

And what is Braxton's relationship to the union? So, interestingly, when he started, he was not a member of the union. From the time I started, I always liked working with the older union guys. But he had enormous admiration for the union workers and how they thought and how they thought about their jobs and how they thought about the power and influence they had. power and influence they had. You know, I learned so much from the generation that built and started those coal mines. I actually got to work with for years and I made a lot of really good friends and I learned a lot just, you know, sitting around listening to the stories that some of the, you know, the old hands would tell. And I think that was probably my favorite part of the job was just listening to them and learning, you know, stuff about the coal mines from them.

And eventually he becomes a member of that union. It happened in a way that was a bit unusual, but not unexpected given what was happening in the coal industry at the time. Explain that. What do you mean? happening in the coal industry at the time. Explain that. What do you mean? Well, in 2015, the coal mining company is working for Jim Walter Resources. It's facing a ton of financial problems. It's weighed down with debt. The price of coal had crashed and they were laying off people, including Braxton. I'd started off in a low position, and I had worked so hard for so many years to prove my knowledge and my ability to run a plant on my own, make decisions, do maintenance, do all this other stuff. Then all of a sudden to say, hey, we don't need you anymore, that part was really tough on me. I took that probably the hardest of all, that I had worked so hard to build up to my position, and then they just let me go like I was nothing.

And then about a year later, as these companies tend to do, Jim Walter Resources reorganizes itself, gets a new name. It's called Warrior Met Coal, and it hires hundreds of miners back. Braxton's one of them. And this time, he's hired into a union job. It was a proud moment for me, you know, when you were a union coal miner, you know, a lot of people kind of looked up to the union coal miners. It was a, they'd had a history of, you know, getting things done when it needed to be done. Okay, so now he's a member of this union, which as you've said, he

deeply admired. So how do things change for him as a result? Well, even from the outset, this newly organized company, things are not as good as they used to be. In order for the company to come out of bankruptcy, the union was forced to agree to take very significant wage cuts and cuts to their benefits. Then they assumed, and the union leaders say they were told explicitly by this coal company, that once the company was doing better and had started turning a profit, their old wages and benefits would be restored. I started in April of 2016. I guess that's when we started realizing that this company had made a major change.

But it quickly became apparent that the company was not going to do that. And Braxton says they knew this in part because the working conditions at the mine were much worse than before the bankruptcy. We worked with skeleton crews. I mean, really, before the bankruptcy, we had 46 union guys. And then after the bankruptcy and we started back, we had 21 union guys. So we were doing twice the work, you know, with less people. So, you know, that was a big change. Now the company disputes that, saying conditions were safe and legitimate, but the union and Braxton aren't happy with the way things are going. And this is all happening against the backdrop of the 2016 presidential election. So you've come back to the mind, you're now a member of a union.

This is 2016. Nationally, coal mining becomes an issue in the presidential election between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Were you paying attention to that? And if so, what was your thinking at the time? Yeah, I was. I know historically, the Democrats has always supported unions, but not necessarily coal miners. So for many decades, the Coal Mining Union and Democrats went hand in hand. The UMWA, the United Mine Workers of America, has been solidly Democratic. In the 1930s, that union was the single largest contributor, the Democratic Party. Wow. So yeah, for a very long time, if you were a coal miner, you voted Democratic.

Mm-hmm. So yeah, for a very long time, if you were a coal miner, you voted Democratic. I'm the only candidate which has a policy about how to bring economic opportunity using clean, renewable energy as the key into coal country. Of course, that has changed because for the Democratic Party, a big issue is climate change. And efforts to combat climate change and coal are not compatible. Because we're going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business. Right, Tim? And we're going to make it clear that we don't want to forget those people. Those people labored in those mines for generations. So by 2016, confirming the union's worst fears were the statements made by Hillary Clinton.

Hillary Clinton later said she was misquoted, quoted out of context. Yeah, I mean, personally, I felt like, you know, if she had become president that we, you know, we wouldn't have coal mines anymore. You know, and I think a lot of people thought the same thing. But it really seemed to confirm what the coal miners had been feeling, which is that they can't count on the Democrats as their party any longer. Meanwhile...

Coal is coming back. Clean coal is coming back. 100%. On the other side of the aisle, Donald Trump seizes on this moment. She wants the mines closed and she will never let them work again. And uses that to become the champion of the aggrieved coal miner. Let me tell you, they're going to start to work again. Believe me. You're going to be proud again to be miners. And makes big promises that he's going to save their jobs, save the industry, bring coal back.

We thought, you know, hey, this is a businessman, you know, not a politician. You know, maybe he will, you know, look out for the workers and not just the interest of politicians, you know. Did you believe him back then that he would indeed save coal? Yes, yes, I did. I mean, us being union coal miners, you know, it's kind of like, you know, the Republicans don't want us because we're union and the Democrats don't want us because we run coal, you know, so we've always been in kind of a hard spot. But, you know, then all of a sudden Trump comes in and says he's going to save coal mines. We just took it

to heart that somebody, hey, somebody, you know, is going to speak up for the coal miners, you know. But Trump couldn't change the economics of coal. And no matter how many regulations he rolled back, coal was in a death spiral. And their industry and its fortunes did not improve. industry and its fortunes did not improve. And meanwhile, at this reorganized company, 2021 comes along and it's coming up till time to, you know, for the contract. Five years have passed and they remembered this company told them that when the next contract came around, they would be made whole, and the things that they had given up, they would get back again. Now, the company disputes that and has put out statements

to the effect that they made no such promises, but that's not how the union remembers it. And they started to negotiate a new contract. And the company, you know, has not even put forth an effort, you know, of negotiating. So, you know, a coal miner has always kind of been a respected, you know, worker. We've always had pride in our work. And it got to the point to where we had no respect in the company. But in the negotiations, the company was not getting back to where they were. So, you know, we worked through 2020, you know, through coronavirus. And on top of that, there's this pandemic. You know, we're deemed essential workers. We're made to work, you know, with really not any kind of safety equipment other than, you know, just the normal stuff that we had before. Showing

up for work every day. It's the super dangerous job. Every time they go down in that mine, these workers risk their lives. That's just coal mining, pandemic or otherwise. You know, we were just another person in a turnover workforce that had no say or opinion about the job or the work we were doing. To feel like the company had made a promise that they were now reneging on,

these workers could not stomach that. And they felt like they had really been betrayed by their employer. I guess you just really have to have been there and be treated the way we were treated and to see that, you know, of how tired that we were, you know, working these long hours, you know, sometimes seven days a week, you know, 28 to 30 days in a row without a day off, you know, tired of not seeing your family. We had voiced our concerns for four years and it was a, you know, kind of a, you know, an agreement that, you know, hey, you know, we're ready for a change, you know, this just ain't working out, you know, something's got to give.

So that's why on April 1st, 2021, the coal miners decided to go on strike. We'll be right back. So Michael, what has this strike been like day to day? Well, let me set the scene. Yeah, the first couple of weeks, it was pretty chaotic. This mine in Brookwood, Alabama is sprawling. I mean, it goes on for hundreds of miles underground and there are many, many entrances. So at each location, you know, you had 10 to 15 people walking with signs that said no contract, no coal. And what this union did was to set up picket lines at every single entrance.

Wow. We had 13 picket lines going. If you took the time to drive, you know, from one and visit all 13 picket lines, it was 120 miles. I mean, they just flooded this place. And when the replacement workers showed up, the union workers let them know what they thought of it. You'd see them, you know, holler at the scab, call them a scab, maybe a few other words. And things got rowdy. There was a lot of anger toward them. Things got a little violent. There was a few instances, you know,

where things kind of got out of hand a little bit. You know, maybe blocking the roads, you know, maybe slapping a few cars here and there as they go by, you know, shaking them a little bit, a busted window or two. That probably shouldn't have happened. So it was pretty ugly. So day after day at the strike, there's this scene of unionized workers standing at all the entrances, confronting the replacement workers. And that goes on for weeks and months. What you didn't see were political leaders standing arm in arm with these unionized coal miners.

Our governor was standing with the company. For instance, the state police who were under the control of the Republican governor, Kay Ivey, they were ostensibly sent in to keep the peace at the picket line. But the miners say the police seem more intent on helping protect the replacement workers and to harass the union picketers than to stay neutral. Then there was the case of this Republican judge who started placing injunctions on the union after the company complained about the picketing. The injunctions just started getting a little more strict each time. about the picketing. The injunctions just started getting a little more strict each time. And those injunctions really limited what the union could do on the picket line. Like, they went from hundreds of people that could be there to like a handful, and it really reduced their presence. And then finally, good old Tuberville, one of their Republican senators, Tommy Tuberville, poor coach and evenberville, former football coach, huge Trump acolyte, explicitly said that he won't back the minors.

Hmm. Why not? I think it is inappropriate for Congress to weigh in on labor disputes which are properly being resolved through the judicial system. disputes which are properly being resolved through the judicial system. His official line is that, you know, it's not his place or Congress's place to get involved in a private business dispute. The miners are incredulous. I mean, these are the Republicans that just a few years ago said they had the miners' backs. When they say that they support the coal industry, I guess they were telling the truth. You know, they supported the industry and not the worker. You know, they supported the company and not the worker. And we're seeing that more, you know, clear as the strike goes on.

The picture just gets clearer as time goes on. Was that a moment and a process where you started thinking differently about Republicans? I'd say so, yeah. I mean, just given how Donald Trump and the Republican Party essentially ran on the backs of the aggrieved coal miner in 2016, and here's a group of aggrieved coal miners, and they won't even talk to them. So this feels like a potentially golden opportunity for Democrats to show their support for these workers and start to make up ground after losing the coal mining labor unions to Trump.

You'd think so. You know, Bernie Sanders has showed us, you know, a good bit of support, but, uh, you know, I guess he's more of an independent. Now there have been some Democrats and independent Bernie Sanders who have talked about this strike and have criticized the company, but it's no one near the attention has been paid by Democrats to this strike that you might expect them to do, given the issues that these workers are raising. Thousands of Amazon warehouse workers in Alabama will vote on whether to become the company's first unionized facility. And what's even more striking to coal miners like Braxton is how Democrats reacted to a union effort going on just 30 miles away in Bessemer at an Amazon warehouse. I am welcome today to have a delegation from Congress who are standing with these workers. There's a congressional delegation that came to the facility and held a press conference. We hear you, Alabama workers, and we are with you.

There should be no intimidation, no coercion, no threats, no anti-union propaganda. President Biden weighed in, warning the company not to mess with the unionization vote. And it's your right, not that of an employer. It's your right. No employer can take that right away. So make your voice heard. Which is almost unheard of for a sitting president to directly weigh in on a unionization effort. I mean, the Democrats made supporting those Amazon workers a big moment. These Democrats or the Democratic Party, the core of it has always aligned itself with workers and particularly unionized workers. Yeah. So is that doubly frustrating or? It really is. I guess being the industry that we're in, you know, a lot of them don't want to get involved.

Almost to the point where we've been abandoned by both sides, you know, really. With our strike, we have. I mean, we have been abandoned by both sides. Do you feel like, you know, for the Democrats, do you understand that dilemma or do you feel that that is misguided? I think it's misguided. You know, each party picks two main things, you know, to Democrats is fossil fuels and abortion. And then Republicans, their big argument is more pro fossil fuels, you know, pro gun and anti-abortion. It's like the both sides are so worried about these three items that they've lost focus on everything else. So a coal miner like Braxton and his co-workers are in a very

strange position. They were once a group beloved by Democrats, and then they were won over by Republicans. And now in their greatest moment of need, if you're someone like Braxton, you wake up and you realize neither party is your ally. That's right. And without any political support, the strike is dragging on and on. It's about a year since the strike began, and Braxton needs a job. You know, I kind of applied to Amazon as a joke, almost. Ironically, he actually gets a job at the Amazon warehouse in Bessemer that he's been trying to unionize.

This is the same warehouse, right, where the now-failed unionization efforts happened and where Democratic officials came out to show their support. Exactly. So I go in through their cattle herding process of being hired. I go through my three days training for the first three days. And then on the next week, I come in to Amazon wearing my camo union shirt.

And everybody's kind of looking at me funny. Your camo uniform, that's like Union Colors. That's right. And while he's there working, sorting boxes, working the overnight shift, he himself gets involved in the effort to unionize at the Bessemer warehouse. Well, I mean, you know, a lot of them, you know, were curious.

You know, why did you go on strike? You know, you were already making, you know, this amount. You know, and we kind of explained to them, you know, it wasn't necessarily about the money. You know, a lot of it was the lack of respect that we used to have. What was the biggest thing you've told them, the biggest, you know, reason they should join a union? What's the main thing you tell them? The solidarity. I mean, me just telling them, you know, hey, you need a union because it could do this better for you, this better for you. And then me showing them, you know, hey, you need a union because it could do this better for you, this better for you. And then me showing them, you know, what the union has been able to do.

And say right now, you're only one voice at a time. If you are a union and you're having the problem, you know, you have, you know, six million instead of one. You don't just have, you know, yourself trying to fight a battle. You have an army of millions, you know, that are ready to support you in your fight. I mean, if it wasn't for the solidarity of just the working class that, you know, we wouldn't have been able to last this long. You know, when we put always sort of labels or, you know, how we identify Democrat, Republican. Do you identify most primarily as a union worker? Yeah, I mean, that's what, you know, I consider myself a union worker.

You know, that's what I am. And if possible, that's what I'm going to stay. That's what I am, and if possible, that's what I'm going to stay. So where does that leave you politically? Kind of in the middle of the road. We've had a lot of support from local and state DSA chapters. The Birmingham DSA chapter shows tremendous support for us. What's that, the DSA?

The Democratic Socialist of America. They're very pro-worker. They support workers. It doesn't matter the industry. To them, we're still a worker. Yeah, we work in fossil fuel, but at the end of the day, we're still a worker. That is important as a worker in another industry. Do you feel like that as a worker, as a coal miner, that there's no place for you in the mainstream political conversation right now? Yeah, pretty much. I mean, each election year, each party stands up and says, you know, we're going to do this and we're going to do that.

And then at the end of the four years, you know, it's very rare that we've seen, you know, anything happen that they promised would happen at the beginning of their time. I'd like to actually see from either side, just, you side just a change toward the workers of the country. I mean, just me as an average working class American, I can't see where either side has done anything to help the working class. So, Michael, I wonder how we should think about Braxton's story. Is this the story of a very unique set of circumstances, a dying industry, coal, that has gotten caught between the changing identities of the two parties?

Or is this a story that we should think about differently? Is it a measure of just how much both parties have failed to speak to working people like Braxton? How do you think about that? So Braxton's one worker in Alabama at a coal mine. But when you think of what a worker like him means for politics, national politics, and the politics of the working class, someone like Braxton, who's had this remarkable journey politically, he should be paid attention to. I told you over and over, it is my belief, if you don't ever quit the fight, I don't care where that fight is, you cannot lose that fight.

I had this experience when I was in Alabama reporting this story. And I was at a rally at the Union Hall, and I looked out at the crowd. And I was just struck by how diverse it was and how many different types of people there were. Black, white, women, men, and I thought, wow, like these people have this one thing in common, which is that they are sticking with this fight. And I thought that is something really remarkable. Now we're gonna win this fight, and I believe we're going to win it sooner than you might think. I talk to workers all over the place.

Workers who are in unions, who are not in unions. They work in manufacturing plants. They work in Walmart, Dollar General. And their stories are very similar. Walmart, Dollar General, and their stories are very similar. There seems to be this grand bargain that's been broken. There was this notion in this country that you get a job, you show up on time, you do well, you can be respected by your employer, you can be paid fairly, and you can advance.

And that doesn't seem to be working right now. There's a whole bunch of people over in that building that hate us. They just hate us because we won't bow down. Because we won't say yes, do whatever you want to us. We won't do that. And they don't understand that we will not subject ourselves to their mercy. I want to thank you for standing up and surviving this long. I want you to know, this is close enough that I can feel it. This is close enough that I can taste it.

And all we need to do is be stronger than them. One day longer than them. One day stronger than them. God bless all of you. U.M.! U.M.! U.M.! U.M.!

U.M.! Oh, Michael, thank you very much. Thank you. We'll be right back. Here's what else you need to know today. Over the weekend, the daughter of a top advisor to Vladimir Putin was killed in what appeared to be a car bombing inside Russia. The woman's death is poised to be a new flashpoint in Russia's war with Ukraine because the victim's father, Alexander Dugin, helped shape the ideas behind Russia's invasion and is an outspoken advocate of the war. behind Russia's invasion and is an outspoken advocate of the war.

Ukrainian officials adamantly denied any rule in her death and said it could be the result of an internal Russian dispute. It was unclear whether it was Dugin or his daughter who was the intended target of the blast. I certainly hope that if it was an attack on either one of those people, that it was an internal Russian affair and it wasn't something emanating from Ukraine. In an interview on Sunday with CNN, Congressman Adam Schiff, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said he hoped that Ukraine was not involved. We have seen terrible war crimes by Russia against Ukraine, and Russia should be held accountable. And I certainly would never want to see anything like an attack on civilians by Ukraine and hope that their representations are correct. Today's episode was produced by Diana Nguyen, Eric Krupke, and Lindsay Garrison.

It was edited by Mark George, contains original music by Marion Lozano and Chelsea Daniel, and was engineered by Marion Lozano. Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landsberg of Wonderly. That's it for The Daily. I'm Michael Barbaro. See you tomorrow.