MANHATTAN — The leadership of the city's subway and bus workers' union has been usurped by an insurgent group that's promised tougher negotiations with the MTA.
John Samuelsen, a subway track inspector, defeated Curtis Tate, the anointed successor to outgoing Transport Workers Union Local 100 president Roger Toussaint, in a vote on Monday.
Samuelsen's "Take Back Our Union" faction won the union's top four positions, according to the Daily News.
Samuelsen painted Toussaint, who led the TWU on a holiday-time strike in 2005, as a weak negotiator who had divided the union, the New York Times reported.
“They weakened the union through their leadership policies,” Samuelsen said, according to the Times, “and backed themselves into a corner, and we were forced to rely on handouts from the company.”
The TWU has been working without a contract since last year. Earlier this year, an arbitrator awarded union members more than 11 percent raises over three years, but the MTA is fighting that in court.
A spokesman for Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who during the 2005 strike called the union "thuggish," declined to comment on the leadership change, the Times reported.
