Build A Fighting NALC: What We Stand For

Build a Fighting NALC (BFN) aims to build a national rank and file reform movement to transform NALC into a democratic, fighting union that engages with and mobilizes the membership to fight for better wages, working conditions, and a high quality public postal service.

We take inspiration from the Rank and File Movement which came out of the 1970 Postal Strike. Starting in Branch 36, the rank and file leaders of the strike organized an opposition group dedicated to transforming the NALC in their time. They won One Member One Vote for national officer positions, and eventually succeeded in electing Vincent Sombrotto president of NALC in 1978. They understood that without an engaged and active rank and file, the NALC could not succeed.

NALC members have been working for over a year without a new contract, with few updates on contract negotiations, and no substantial content about what is being put forward at the bargaining table. As of December 2023 prices for goods were on average 19% higher than in 2019, and from the grocery store to the gas pump, members are feeling the impact of inflation everywhere. NALC’s leadership has refused to put forward a fighting approach to contract negotiations to engage and activate the membership around, and Postmaster General Louis Dejoy has gone full speed ahead with his 10-year-plan to deteriorate service and pave the way for potential privatization.

The gains made by unions in the past few years, like the Teamsters at UPS, and in particular autoworkers in the UAW, show what’s possible when unions get organized around a fighting strategy to fight for our interests.

A broader reform movement is forming in NALC. The formation of the Concerned Letter Carriers (CLC) reform slate with current Vice President James Henry at the top of the ticket, and the announcement that Business Agent Mike Caref will be running to challenge the Renfroe administration in 2026 are very positive developments. But just replacing Renfroe is not enough, we need to utilize the 2026 national leadership elections to transform our union going forward.

Build a Fighting NALC seeks to be a part of the broader reform movement in NALC, and will be organized around a program, a concrete set of demands that we believe are needed to transform NALC into a fighting, democratic union. This program is not set in stone, it will be a living document that will be updated as the situation develops, and we seek to have it be voted on and adopted by members and supporters of Build a Fighting NALC.

Program Organize and Fight for:

● Open Bargaining: We need Open Bargaining during Contract negotiations, and democratic accountability during the negotiation process. Transparency is a basic democratic right. NALC needs to mobilize the membership with public rallies at the beginning of negotiations and at key times throughout, to build solidarity among the membership, to win public support, and to put pressure on USPS to settle a contract and not let the process drag out.

● $30/hour Starting Wage: As recently as 2013 this was, adjusted for inflation, the starting wage for city letter carriers. This is the wage that made being a city letter carrier the ticket to the middle class and kept the job extremely competitive for so many years.

● End Mandatory Overtime: End forced overtime for carriers who only want to work 40 hours a week, and maintain the right for carriers to sign up for the overtime list.

● Worker’s Wage for Union Officers: All full time union officers to make no more than letter carrier top pay. We need union officers who are there to be the best possible representative for the membership, and it’s unjust, and creates an extra layer of disconnection between leadership and the membership when the NALC president makes nearly $300k a year, five or six times that of a new carrier.

● Right to Strike: NALC should fight to abolish the Article 18 “No-Strike Clause” from our contract, and organize with other Postal and Federal unions, and the AFL-CIO to fight to repeal the federal ban on federal workers from striking, build public support, and lobby Congress for this basic democratic right.

The Future of Build a Fighting NALC and The Road to a National Reform Caucus In 2024

Build a Fighting NALC has brought together hundreds of NALC members from across the country through national Zoom organizing meetings. These meetings began as a way to build support and momentum for the Open Bargaining resolution going into the August 2024 National Convention. 41 NALC branches and 2 NALC state associations have passed the Open Bargaining resolution as of July 2024, and our movement is in a strong position to fight for the resolution at the convention. While hosting these Zoom organizing meetings it quickly became clear that we need to do more than just pass Open Bargaining, we need a national rank and file movement to transform the NALC in the months and years to come. A rank and file movement means to fight for a “rank and file” approach, to build a union that utilizes our biggest source of strength, the membership, and organizes and activates the members to fight, from the workroom floor to the national contract.

Our immediate next steps are to get organized to fight for the Open Bargaining resolution, and the resolution opposing S&DC’s and postal consolidation at the National Convention. At the convention Build a Fighting NALC will be hosting a public meeting/launch event, to publicly announce in person our intention to launch as a national rank and file reform movement, with plans to move towards an official reform caucus with a democratically voted on platform and leadership structures.

The reform movement will come from developing chapters in NALC branches across the country, which is why the National Convention will be so important for us to meet face-to-face and begin that process. There we can identify the individuals and groups of NALC members who are interested in developing BFN chapters in their areas.

The BFN Coordinating Committee will develop a process to hold a national convention of our own on Zoom in the winter or spring of 2025, to assess our progress and agree on a way forward. There as a group we will vote on our program, demands, leadership and organizational structures, so that we can organize the national rank and file reform caucus necessary to Build a Fighting NALC!

View a downloadable version of BFN’s platform here.