Full List of Senators Who Voted Against Giving Rail Workers Paid Sick Leave

A whopping 43 people who have unlimited sick days voted to prevent around 115,000 rail workers from gaining just seven paid sick leave days.

Here are the senators who voted Thursday against giving rail workers paid sick leave. Forty-two are Republicans, and one is a Democrat.

1. Ben Sasse
2. Bill Cassidy
3. Bill Hagerty
4. Chuck Grassley
5. Cynthia M. Lummis
6. Dan Sullivan
7. Deb Fischer
8. James E. Risch
9. James Lankford
10. James M. Inhofe
11. Jerry Moran
12. Joe Manchin, III
13. John Barrasso
14. John Boozman
15. John Cornyn
16. John Hoeven
17. John Thune
18. Joni Ernst
19. Kevin Cramer
20. Lisa Murkowski
21. Marsha Blackburn
22. Mike Crapo
23. Mike Lee
24. Mike Rounds
25. Mitch McConnell
26. Mitt Romney
27. Patrick J. Toomey
28. Rand Paul
29. Richard C. Shelby
30. Rick Scott
31. Rob Portman
32. Roger F. Wicker
33. Roger Marshall
34. Ron Johnson
35. Roy Blunt
36. Shelley Moore Capito
37. Steve Daines
38. Susan M. Collins
39. Thom Tillis
40. Tim Scott
41. Todd Young
42. Tom Cotton
43. Tommy Tuberville

Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a state built by union workers, voted against providing paid sick leave to rail unions on Thursday.

Four out of 12 rail unions—representing the majority of rail workers—have been threatening to strike, after a labor deal brokered by President Joe Biden failed to meet their demands for paid sick leave. Workers currently get zero paid sick days. Biden, who has touted himself as a “pro-labor president,” called for Congress to impose the deal anyway and block the strike, saying it would cause too much economic damage.

The House voted Wednesday to end the strike but included a last-minute amendment proposed by progressives to give the unions seven days of sick leave.

The Senate, however, voted to impose the labor agreement but not add the paid leave amendment. Six Republicans voted in favor of the amendment. Manchin was the only Democrat to vote against it. He also voted to block the strike. The bill will now go to Biden for his signature.

Manchin had expressed misgivings about the amendment on Wednesday, saying he would need to read it over first. But he did say he would vote for “anything to prevent a strike that will enhance inflation and cause economic harm to our country.”

Although Manchin has become known for consistently throwing a wrench into Biden’s plans, he frustratingly seems in line with the president this time. Despite being known as both “Union Joe” and “Amtrak Joe,” Biden did not push for the paid leave amendment after its success in the House.

“The President of course, of course he supports paid sick leave for all Americans, including rail workers, but he does not support any bill, or amendment, that will delay getting this bill to his desk by this Saturday,” White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters after the House vote.

Manchin’s votes sting even more considering his state’s long history with union labor. Although union membership in West Virginia is currently about 10.7 percent, a little lower than the national average, the state’s unions are still strong for a right-to-work state.

West Virginia union workers helped build the state’s economy—particularly in coal mining—and have a long history of agitating for better working conditions.

The Senate voted Thursday to advance a labor agreement to avert a rail strike—but not give workers needed paid sick leave.

The Senate voted 80-15 to advance a labor agreement brokered by President Joe Biden. The agreement is to be imposed on about 115,000 rail workers across the country. The Senate also voted 52-43 rejecting a measure to add seven paid sick leave days to the agreement. One Democrat, Joe Manchin, and 42 Republicans voted against. Rail workers currently have no paid sick days.

On Wednesday, the House overwhelmingly passed the labor agreement, but narrowly passed the measure to add the sick leave days to the deal. In between the House and Senate vote, Biden refused to whip momentum up for the measure, choosing instead to focus on the success of the labor deal he arranged.

Now, the agreement—without the sick leave provision—goes to the White House, where Biden is expected to sign it.

The paid sick leave measure, given to Biden on a platter by progressives, offered the president a second chance at getting it right for rail workers. But Biden did not express his support for the bill or engage with the notion that perhaps the best way to avert a strike is to address demands that prompted the threat in the first place.

The government’s failure to finally give rail workers paid sick days is disgraceful. More disgraceful is how Biden allowed, and even encouraged, such a failure to occur. He could have used the bully pulpit, and the momentum generated by workers and committed members of his caucus, to harden his supposed legacy as among the most pro-worker presidents.

Unfortunately, today’s outcome reveals that “Union Joe” may just be another hollow moniker. Given that a majority of rail workers have rejected Biden’s now-passed tentative agreement, it’s not necessarily guaranteed his lackluster deal will stop a strike anyways.

The House Judiciary Committee Republicans finally deleted a controversial tweet Thursday expressing support for Elon Musk, Donald Trump, and Kanye West—after the rapper praised Hitler and the Nazis.

The House Judiciary GOP account tweeted “Kanye. Elon. Trump” in early October. The tweet stayed up through multiple controversies, including all three men seeming to embrace some form of white supremacy.

The New Republic reached out to the office of ranking committee member Jim Jordan about the deleted tweet but did not hear back by press time.

West, now known as “Ye,” gave an unhinged, multihour interview on InfoWars Thursday, during which he formally said he was a Nazi sympathizer. He said people should stop being mean to Nazis, as they had done some good things, and at one point said, “I like Hitler.” He also denied the Holocaust, saying it was “factually incorrect” that Hitler killed six million Jews.

West appeared on the show alongside Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes. Both of them met with Trump last week—a meeting that very few Republicans have condemned.

Although the InfoWars interview seems to have been the straw that broke the camel’s back, Ye has been increasingly outspoken about his antisemitism in the past few months. He wore a “White Lives Matter” T-shirt to his Yeezy fashion show in October, just days before the Judiciary GOP posted the tweet, and he tweeted later in the month that he would go “death con 3 on JEWISH PEOPLE.”

That tweet got him banned from Twitter and cost him many major brand deals, including with Adidas.

Musk, however, said he’d spoken with Ye and insisted the musician had learned his lesson. Then, a month later, Musk shared a Nazi photo on Twitter the day before the midterm elections. A few days later, he welcomed Ye back onto the platform.

Since Musk took over, hate speech has skyrocketed on Twitter. The social media research group National Contagion Research Institute said that in the 12 hours since Musk bought Twitter, use of the n-word increased almost 500 percent.

As for Trump, in addition to meeting with Fuentes, he has made veiled threats to the American Jewish community and embraced white supremacists. He chillingly told the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by” during a 2020 presidential debate.

On Thursday, Kanye West, known now as “Ye,” appeared on InfoWars alongside antisemite and white supremacist Nick Fuentes. There, Ye formally came out as a Nazi sympathizer.

“You’re not Hitler, you’re not a Nazi, you don’t deserve to be called that and demonized,” Alex Jones insisted to Ye.

“Well, I see good things about Hitler, also” Ye said.

He went on to complain that he has to love Jews, and what they’re doing with “contracts” and “pornography,” but that he can’t also appreciate “this guy that invented highways, invented the very microphone that I use as a musician,” seemingly misconstruing the false notion that the Nazis invented the microwave oven and the autobahn highway in Germany.

“Every human being has something of value that they brought to the table, especially Hitler.”

At another point in the interview, West simply says, “I like Hitler.”

The House Judiciary GOP’s infamous tweet that read “Kanye. Elon. Trump,” has now been deleted as of Thursday afternoon. Unfortunately, the tweet’s expressive function as some form of a Nazi summoning hex has been dealt.

Elon Musk continues to reinstate racist, antisemitic, and inflammatory Twitter accounts—including Ye. The disgraced hip hop artist and ex-billionaire has now quadrupled down on straightforward Nazi propaganda. Trump himself shared an evening meal with Fuentes and Ye last week, thereafter attempting to distance himself, claiming he “didn’t know” who Fuentes was. On InfoWars Thursday, Ye claimed Trump “loved” Fuentes.