FedEx Launches Deceptive Campaign to Protect Special Deal in Congress

FedEx is launching a deceptive public relations campaign to preserve the legal loophole it has exploited for decades.

FedEx is the sole beneficiary of a provision that its lobbyists quietly slipped back into legislation in October 1996, making FedEx Express the only freight and package-delivery company in the United States whose non-FAA-certified employees are regulated under the Railway Labor Act governing airlines and railroads.

“The real victims here are FedEx’s own workers,” said Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa. “Fred Smith would rather spend millions of dollars on misleading ad campaigns and high-priced lobbyists than allow workers a real chance to form a union.”

Employees performing the same jobs in the same industry should be covered by the same labor laws. A sorter, loader, unloader, driver and courier working for FedEx Express should fall under the National Labor Relations Act, as they do at every other company in the industry. FedEx is so used to competing on an uneven playing field that it now views equal treatment as a “bailout.”

The House last month recognized the need to restore fairness to the freight and package delivery industry, voting overwhelmingly to apply one set of rules to all express delivery companies.

“The real bailout here is the bailout that the federal government and the American people have given to FedEx over the past several decades,” said Ken Hall, Teamsters International Vice President and Package Division Director. “In an economy where the federal and state governments are hurting for revenue, FedEx has consistently refused to pay taxes for its own employees and has even been investigated by IRS, state attorneys general and state governments. American taxpayers are fed up with large, well-connected corporations exploiting our government for special favors.”