That’s the headline in a Bloomberg Businessweek story written yesterday by John Hughes. Some excerpts:
FedEx Corp. Chief Executive Officer Fred Smith is misleading the public on air-safety legislation and “bought his way” to be covered by a 1996 labor law that helped his company, a House committee chairman said.
U.S. Representative James Oberstar, a Minnesota Democrat and chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, rejected Smith’s characterization that a labor measure the chairman wrote is holding up aviation-safety legislation.
Smith is “peddling a false image” of the bill’s status, Oberstar told reporters today on a conference call after meeting relatives of victims in a Colgan Air crash who are pushing for action on the measure. “He ought to be telling the truth rather than misleading the public.”
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Oberstar said Smith “bought his way into this position” by persuading Congress in 1996 to enact legislation ensuring the workers in FedEx’s Express unit are classified under a law that applies to airlines and requires national organizing campaigns rather than local votes.
Oberstar, in response to a question about Smith’s campaign donations to supporters of the provision, said Smith “worked his way around the Senate” on the 1996 law.
Indeed, for almost a year now our organization has been chronicling the misleading information that FedEx lobbyists and PR representatives have been spreading about this amendment to the FAA reauthorization bill which would place FedEx Express delivery drivers under the same labor law as every other delivery driver in the nation.
What’s it say about your position on an issue when you have to mislead the public and Congress in order to sell it?