Looming New Jersey Transit strike could impact 350,000 commuters, say officials
Gary Hershorn/ABC News
(NEW YORK) — Some 350,000 New Jersey commuters could soon find themselves scrambling for other ways to get to work if contract disagreements between New Jersey Transit and its engineers’ union aren’t resolved, according to transit officials.
The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET) has threatened to strike as early as Friday, May 16 unless NJ Transit and the union are able to agree on new contract terms and conditions for the workers who drive the trains. If no deal is reached, all New Jersey Transit commuter trains – and the MTA Metro-North West of Hudson service – will stop running.
“We have sought nothing more than equal pay for equal work, only to be continuously rebuffed by New Jersey Transit,” BLET General Chairman Tom Haas said during a press conference on May 9. “New Jersey Transit engineers want to keep the trains moving but the simple fact is that trains do not run without engineers.”
BLET National President Mark Wallace said during the press conference that it’s been five years since train engineers working for NJ Transit have received a pay increase. He also said many engineers might seek work at Amtrak or the Long Island Railroad if their contract requirements are not met.
“Reasonable people would vote for an agreement that is fair,” Wallace said.
Haas said during the news conference that engineers working for NJ Transit earn an average salary of $113,000 a year. If New Jersey Transit CEO Kris Kolluri agrees to an average salary of $170,000 a year for engineer operators, then “we got a deal,” Haas said.
“NJ TRANSIT locomotive engineers already have average total earnings of $135,000 annually, with the highest earners exceeding $200,000,” according to a statement on the New Jersey Transit website regarding negotiations with the BLET.
During a separate press conference the same day, Kolluri responded to the union’s arguments, saying Haas previously agreed to a wage increase to $49.82 an hour but then later demanded even higher wages because he thought there was “a better pot at the end of the rainbow.”
“I cannot keep giving money left and right to solve a problem. It all comes down to, who is going to pay for this? Money does not grow on trees,” Kolluri said.
ABC News requests sent to NJ Transit and the BLET for comment regarding Wallace, Haas and Kolluri’s statements concerning pay increase claims did not receive a response.
According to TV station WABC in New York, both sides will meet again Thursday morning for 11th-hour negotiations to avert the strike.
New Jersey Transit and BLET representatives met Monday with the National Mediation Board in Washington, D.C. to continue negotiations.
“We want to thank the National Mediation Board (NMB) for convening today’s meeting,” NJ Transit said in a statement on their website following the meeting. “We found the discussion to be constructive and look forward to continuing negotiations in good faith. To respect the collective bargaining process, we will not be sharing any additional details publicly at this time.”
There was no public BLET statement following the National Mediation Board meeting, nor did BLET immediately respond to an ABC News request for comment.
NJ Transit states that if they were to accept BLET’s terms, it would cost both them and New Jersey taxpayers $1.363 billion between July 2025 and June 2030. Additionally, if BLET chooses to strike, the taxpayer cost of providing a limited alternative service via buses would be $4 million per day, NJ Transit claims.
NJ Transit commuters were already hit with a 15% fare increase on July 1, 2024, with an additional systemwide 3% fare increase scheduled to go into effect July 1 of this year and every subsequent year. NJ Transit said that the increase was necessary in order to cover a budget deficit caused in part by a pandemic-era decrease in ridership, as well as other increased costs, including inflation.
Should the strike commence on May 16, NJ Transit said it “strongly encourages all those who can work from home to do so and limit traveling on the NJ Transit system to essential purposes only.”
NJ Transit officials also said that they’ve developed a contingency plan that includes adding “very limited capacity to existing New York commuter bus routes in close proximity to rail stations and contracting with private carriers to operate bus service” for commuters that typically rely on the trains.
Even with the expanded bus service, however, NJ Transit said that it “estimates that it can only carry approximately 20% of current rail customers” because the bus system doesn’t have the capacity to replace commuter rail service.
Xuan Sharon Di, associate professor of civil engineering and engineering mechanics at Columbia University, told ABC News the potential NJ Transit strike would be a “disaster” for the traffic in Manhattan due to the increased bus and car traffic into the city from commuters unable to take the train. There also will be the added penalty of commuters into Manhattan having to pay recently enacted congestion pricing.
“New Jersey Transit is the backbone for people who live in New Jersey to move around. This is actually shocking to me,” Di told ABC News of the prospect of a strike.
Steven Chien, civil and environmental engineering professor at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, said many of his colleagues use NJ Transit to commute and that a strike will “paralyze vital transportation arteries in our regions.”
(CAMBRIDGE, Mass.) — As thousands of Harvard University students and their families gather this morning for commencement, a legal battle that could affect the school’s future is playing out a few miles away in a Boston federal courthouse.
A federal judge set a hearing Thursday morning to decide whether to extend an order blocking the Trump administration from stripping Harvard of its ability to enroll international students.
In an escalation of Trump’s recent attacks on Harvard, the Department of Homeland Security last week revoked the school’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification, throwing the status of the school’s nearly 7,000 international students into immediate uncertainty.
Harvard quickly sued to block the policy, arguing the students have become “pawns in the government’s escalating campaign of retaliation” — and a federal judge on Friday granted a temporary order that barred the Trump administration from revoking the school’s SEVP certification.
U.S. District Allison Burroughs, an Obama appointee, granted the temporary order within hours of Harvard filing its lawsuit, writing that the school was likely to suffer “immediate and irreparable injury” if the policy was enacted. Harvard’s lawyers have argued that nearly every one of its international students would have to transfer or drop out if the Trump administration carries out the revocation.
“With the stroke of a pen, the government has sought to erase a quarter of Harvard’s student body, international students who contribute significantly to the University and its mission,” their lawsuit said.
Arguing that the Trump administration actions are part of a “campaign to coerce Harvard into surrendering its First Amendment rights,” Harvard has alleged that the SEVP revocation is unlawful because it violates the school’s free speech rights; that the policy is arbitrary and therefore violates the Administrative Procedure Act; and that the policy runs roughshod over the school’s due process protections because it was not given the opportunity to respond to the revocation.
“The surrounding events, and Defendants’ express statements, make clear that the Department of Homeland Security took these actions not for any valid reason, but purely as punishment for Harvard’s speech, its perceived viewpoint, and its refusal to surrender its academic independence or relinquish its constitutional rights,” the lawsuit argued.
“It is the latest act by the government in clear retaliation for Harvard exercising its First Amendment rights to reject the government’s demands to control Harvard’s governance, curriculum, and the ‘ideology’ of its faculty and students,” said the suit.
DHS officials have said that the revocation was necessary because Harvard failed to turn over information about international students — including disciplinary records — as requested by the Trump administration.
“It is a privilege, not a right, for universities to enroll foreign students and benefit from their higher tuition payments to help pad their multibillion-dollar endowments. Harvard had plenty of opportunity to do the right thing. It refused.’ DHS Secretary Kristi Noem said in a statement last week.
Harvard is also fighting the Trump administration’s attempt to freeze more $2.2 billion in grants and $60 million in contracts to the school. Harvard filed a separate lawsuit to challenge the funding freeze in April, and the next hearing in that case is set for July.
Trump has continued to ratchet up the pressure on the school over the last two months, threatening to revoke the school’s tax-exempt status, directing his administration to cancel contracts with the school, and continuing to demand information on international students. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Trump suggested that Harvard should cap the number of international students to 15% of the school’s total student body.
“We have people who want to go to Harvard and other schools, they can’t get in because we have foreign students there. But I want to make sure that the foreign students are people that can love our country,” Trump said.
(WASHINGTON0 — President Donald Trump is set to headline a fundraiser for the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts next month, according to an invitation obtained by ABC News, for which the top sponsorship level is selling for $2 million.
The event, hosted by the Kennedy Center’s board of trustees, includes a VIP reception followed by the center’s opening night performance of Les Misérables.
Trump — who recently overhauled the Kennedy Center’s leadership — is scheduled to appear at the event “as a special guest and friend of the Kennedy Center,” according to the invite, and “is not directly soliciting donations.”
For the event, the top “gold” sponsorship level costs $2 million. It includes a performance box and a photo op with Trump, as well as what’s described in the invitation as premier seating and admission to the VIP reception for 10.
The “silver” level sponsorship costs $100,000, and includes a photo op with Trump, seating for the performance and admission to the VIP reception for two.
The White House referred ABC News to the Kennedy Center for comment. A Kennedy Center spokesperson declined to comment.
Trump — who has referred to the center as an “American jewel” — has overhauled the center since taking office, terminating much of its leadership.
Members of the board appointed by Trump include close allies such as White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and second lady Usha Vance. The board in turn elected Trump as its chair and his longtime ally Ric Grennell as its president.
The management overhaul sparked backlash within the cultural world, with some shows like “Hamilton” canceling planned performances. Trump, in turn, said he “never liked ‘Hamilton’ very much.”
During a visit to the Kennedy Center for the new board’s first meeting in March, Trump said the center had been in “tremendous disrepair” due to “bad management.”
“We’ll bring it back,” he said. “We’ll make it great again.”
(LOS ANGELES) — President Donald Trump defended his decision to send the National Guard troops to Los Angeles to quash protests that turned violent, saying in a social media post on Sunday that “if we had not done so, Los Angeles would have been completely obliterated.”
Trump alleged the nation’s second largest city, which covers more than 500 square miles, had been “invaded and occupied by illegal aliens and criminals” and that he had directed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Attorney General Pam Bondi to coordinate with all relevant agencies to “take all such actions necessary to liberate Los Angeles from the Migrant Invasion, and put an end to these Migrant riots.”
While Trump has painted Los Angeles as being under siege and out of control, most of the demonstrations this past weekend over his administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration has been concentrated in downtown Los Angeles near the federal building and federal detention center. Other protests have also occurred outside of the downtown area, one in the Los Angeles County city of Paramount, about 14 miles from downtown, and another in Compton, which is next to Paramount, and about 12 miles from downtown LA, according to local law enforcement.
Meanwhile the rest of Los Angeles appeared to go about life as normal over the weekend. The city’s annual Pride Parade even took place on Sunday without incident in Hollywood about 7 miles from downtown.
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and California Gov. Gavin Newsom have accused Trump of making sensational public claims about how widespread the violence has been, and both have said the Los Angeles police and sheriff’s departments could handle the unrest on their own.
“He flamed the fires and illegally acted” by mobilizing the National Guard to go to LA without the conscent of local and state officials, Newsom said of the president in a statement on Monday posted on social media. “The order he signed doesn’t just apply to CA. It will allow him to go into ANY STATE and do the same thing. We’re suing him.”
On Monday, a U.S. official confirmed that 700 Marines in California have been ordered to assist in Los Angeles and they’re expected to arrive over the next 24 hours, a U.S. official confirmed.
LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell has decried the escalation of violence during the protests, saying officers had been targeted with Molotov cocktails, fireworks and rocks.
But he also said Monday that the arrival of the military troops in Los Angeles “presents a significant logistical and operation challenge for those of us charged with safeguarding this city.”
“The Los Angeles Police Department, alongside our mutual aid partners, has decades of experience managing large-scale public demonstrations, and we remain confident in our ability to do so professionally and effectively. That said, our top priority is the safety of both the public and the officers on the ground,” McDonnell said.
At a news conference Monday evening, as the protests entered their fourth night — with some tense confrontations between protesters and police leading to the firing of less lethal munitions by police — Bass insisted the city could handle the unrest on its own.
Asked about the deployment of the Marines, Bass responded incredulously.
“We didn’t need the National Guard,” she told reporters. “Why on earth — what are they going to do? Do you know what the National Guard is doing now? They are guarding two buildings. They’re guarding the federal building here in downtown and they’re guarding the federal building in Westwood. That’s what they’re doing. So they need Marines on top of it, I don’t understand that.”
Trump bypassed Newsom and activated 2,100 California National Guard troops, including 1,700 on the ground in Los Angeles as of Monday night and the remainder on standby to be sent there, the U.S. Northern Command said in a social media post late Monday night. It marks the first time a president has mobilized troops without a governor’s consent since President Lyndon B. Johnson did so in 1965, when he sent National Guard troops to Alabama to protect civil rights activists marching from Selma to Montgomery.
Protest erupts
The protests erupted on Friday in downtown Los Angeles after word filtered into the community that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents were conducting raids on multiple locations in the downtown area without the consent of city officials, including a Home Depot in the Westlake neighborhood near downtown. The raids resulted in the arrests of 40 people, 35 of them Mexican citizens, Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum said on Sunday.
Dozens of protesters began gathering in the Fashion District of downtown, where one of the raids occurred at an apparel business, officials said. Around 3 p.m. local time on Friday, aerial footage taken by ABC Los Angeles station KABC, showed what appeared to be ICE agents loading two white vans with people in handcuffs. As the vans left the apparel business, protesters tried unsuccessfully to stop them, including one individual who was seen lying down the road in the path of one of the vans.
As the raids were unfolding on Friday, Mayor Bass, issued a post on X, condemning ICE’s actions, writing, “we will not stand for this.”
Around 6 p.m. on Friday, crowds gathered outside the Edward R. Roybal Federal Building and the U.S. Courthouse downtown and began vandalizing the buildings, spay painting profanities directed at ICE on the facade and clashing with ICE agents. Federal authorities asked the LAPD to assist around 6:30 p.m., but it took city officers about an hour to arrive at the scene due to “significant traffic congestions, and the presence of demonstrators, and notably, by the fact that federal agents had deployed irritants into the crowd prior to LAPD’s arrival.”
The LAPD declared the protest an “unlawful assembly” soon after officers arrived on scene on Friday night, writing on social media that “officers are reporting that a small group of violent individuals are throwing large pieces of concrete” and warning protesters that “the use of less lethal munitions has been authorized by the Incident Commander” to disperse the crowd.
“Within 55 minutes of receiving the call, we began to disperse the hostile and riotous crowd,” the LAPD said.
Video showed police in riot gear confronting protesters with batons and firing what appeared to be tear gas canisters and flash bangs at the demonstators.
Around the same time, a protest broke out in neighboring Compton, where a vehicle was set ablaze in the street near the iconic Dale’s Donuts sign, according to video taken at the scene.
Demonstration moves to Paramount
On Saturday, the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department received calls around 10:15 a.m. that a “significant” crowd was gathering in Paramount and obstructing traffic and that deputies observed the presence of federal agents in the area.
“As the situation escalated, the crowd of protesters became increasingly agitated, throwing objects and exhibiting violent behavior toward federal agents and deputy sheriffs,” the sheriff’s department said in a statement. “In response, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department (LASD) requested additional resources countywide, deploying additional deputies to maintain order.”
The sheriff’s department said it responded to the scene to protect federal agents under attack, but emphasized, “This does not mean that we are assisting with their immigration actions or operations.”
Bass said that there were no ICE raids in Paramount or anywhere else in Los Angeles County on Saturday. She said the building that protesters gathered near was being used as a staging area for federal resources.
The LAPD said 29 people were arrested during Saturday’s protest, mostly for failing to disperse, but overall it said in a statement that demonstrations across the city of Los Angeles on Saturday “remained peaceful, and we commend all those who exercised their First Amendment rights responsibly.”
Trump deploys National Guard
On Saturday night, Trump signed a presidential memorandum authorizing the deployment of National Guard members to Los Angeles, saying it was necessary to “address the lawlessness” in Los Angeles.
Newsom called Trump’s move, “purposely inflammatory and will only escalate tensions.”
Bass agreed and issued a plea to the White House to reverse the decision.
“Deploying federalized troops on the heels of these raids is a chaotic escalation,” Bass said in a statement posted on social media on Saturday afternoon. “The fear people are feeling in our city right now is very real — it’s felt in our communities and within our families and it puts our neighborhoods at risk. This is the last thing that our city needs, and I urge protestors to remain peaceful.”
Newsom called the president’s decision “an alarming abuse of power.”
Around 2:18 a.m. local time time on Sunday, the LAPD issued a traffic advisory, reporting that demonstrators were approaching the Metropolitan Detention Center in downtown Los Angeles and warned that the unlawful assembly order declared on Friday was still in effect. Around the same time, the LAPD said it received reports that demonstrators were jumping onto the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation tracks near the Little Tokyo Train Station downtown, causing all trains to be halted as officers reponded.
The National Guard began arriving in Los Angeles around 4 a.m. on Sunday, taking up a position outside the Roybal federal building.
Protesters who defied the order to stay away, assembled in front of the Roybal federal building and detention center, heckling National Guard members and police within earshot. Around 3:30 p.m., the LAPD issued another traffic advisory that a group of demonstrators was marching into the downtown area.
Later Sunday, demonstrators began approaching to 101 Freeway and eventually got onto the southbound lanes of the freeway, prompting authorities to close the freeway in both directions, police said.
The protest soon devolved into demonstrators standing on an overpass throwing concrete, bottles and other objects at officers attempting to remove demonstrators from the freeway.
As the protest grew more rowdy, several Waymo autonomous vehicles were set on fire in the downtown area, prompting the company to halt service to downtown LA. Police said protesters threw fireworks at officers during the standoff and police said stores were looted in the downtown area.
Officials said two LAPD officers were injured by motorcyclists attempting to breach a skirmish line police had established.
The LAPD said 21 people were arrested on Sunday on charges ranging from attempted murder with a Molotov cocktail to looting to failure to disperse. The California Highway Patrol said 19 people were arrested for disobeying orders to disperse from the 101 Freeway.
The LAPD announced on Monday that the police force was going on “Tactical Alert,” meaning all personnel are to remain on duty as the city braced for another evening of protests.
As protests in Los Angeles entered their fourth night, photos from the scene showed tense moments as demonstrators confronted authorities.
At one point, police said protesters near Temple Street and Los Angeles Street in downtown LA began throwing objects at police and police authorized the use of “less lethal munitions” in response.
