On Thursday, Congress voted to impose a contract on 120,000 freight railroad workers and preemptively break the first national rail stoppage in thirty years. The move ends three years of negotiations, mediation, and federal intervention under the Railway Labor Act (RLA), the federal law that governs railroad workers.

In the final months of the process, rail workers voted down several tentative agreements, held informational pickets, and raised the issue of paid sick leave for railroad workers to national headlines. On Monday, the White House announced their intention to impose the labor secretary–brokered tentative agreement on the workers; through public pressure and legislative maneuvering, progressives forced a vote on paid sick days in the House, only for the demand to lose in Senate, with a 52-43 vote in favor failing to clear the sixty-vote threshold.

Throughout the showdown, Railroad Workers United (RWU), a rank-and-file organization across all twelve rail unions, pushed for stronger agreements, workers to vote no on bad contracts, and federal action on the side of the workers, rather than railroad companies.