125 Years Strong – An IUOE History

INTERNATIONAL UNION OF OPERATING ENGINEERS
northern portion of the pipeline, required
because the project crossed the international
border between the United States and Canada,
citing potential environmental concerns.
Following that announcement, I.U.O.E.
General President James Callahan, who had
ascended to the union’s top office in November
2011, vowed “to work with our partners in
labor and the industry to bring vital energy
projects like Keystone XL online and to create
the kind of high-paying, skilled jobs that are so
vital to our economy, our members and their
families.” But ongoing delays of the permit
were continued by then-President Obama, after
which President Donald Trump on January 24,
2017, signed an executive order to expedite
final permit approval for the pipeline, which
was granted in March, before new President
Joe Biden signed an executive order on January
20, 2021, to revoke the permit granted to TC
Energy and stop the work.
Meanwhile, the I.U.O.E. did not sit idly by
on other fronts, and in early 2011 the union
launched a new activist program in an effort
to engage every member to advocate for goodpaying
jobs. “It is time we change the way we
do things,” General President Giblin said in
reassessing the union’s political program. With
those goals, the new program urged members
to register through the union’s website to
receive email action alerts from the I.U.O.E.
Engineers Action and Response Network
that would enable them to easily contact
elected officials regarding legislation to create
and protect jobs for operating engineers.
General President Giblin retired in November
2011, at which time Brother Callahan, a thirdgeneration
operating engineer who was serving as
the part-time general secretary-treasurer and Local
No. 15 business manager, took over the position.
The General Executive Board had earlier elected
Brother Callahan to complete President Giblin’s
unexpired term through April 2013.
Cranes operated by members of I.U.O.E. Local No. 49 of Minneapolis erect the city’s new U.S. Bank Stadium, which was built
from December 2013 to July 2016 to serve as home of the Minnesota Vikings of the National Football League, among other uses.
The view of Buffalo-based I.U.O.E. Local No. 17 member Brother Paul Hopkins as he works on construction of the Harbor
Center mixed-use development built from March 1, 2013, to August 2015 with two Liebherr tower cranes on site.
Prior to his appointment as general secretarytreasurer
on July 1, 2011, Brother Callahan
was seventh vice president of the international
while also business manager of his home local.
Upon the resignation of General Secretary-
Treasurer Christopher Hanley, the General
Executive Board during its May 24, 2011,
meeting voted to transform the position
of general secretary-treasurer – which had
essentially been unchanged since at least 1938
– from full-time to part-time and ruled that
“the occupant shall not be required by virtue of
election to relinquish local union office.”
Passage of a highway bill, the Moving Ahead
for Progress in the 21 st Century Act, whose
job-creating capability for operating engineers
dwarfed that of any other single piece of
legislation, was the top legislative priority for the
I.U.O.E. during the 2012 congressional session.
With the union’s efforts, Congress approved the
$105-billion highway measure, clearing the way
LABOR OMNIA VINCIT
for operating engineers and other construction
workers to get back to rebuilding the country’s
vital transportation network after President
Obama quickly signed the bill.
But on October 29, 2012, Hurricane
Sandy unleashed its superstorm-level fury on
the northeastern United States, decimating
communities, including the homes and vehicles
of more than 500 I.U.O.E. members, some
of whom lost nearly everything they owned.
Despite the overwhelming devastation and
personal loss, thousands of operating engineers
mobilized, using their skills to assist rescue
crews and utility workers in gaining access to
homes and communities cut off by flood waters
or buried beneath sand and debris.
In the wake of that disaster, that year the
I.U.O.E. National Charity Fund paid out
over $1.7 million in claims resulting from the
hurricane and other natural disasters in the
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