Ed Halse walks the picket line outside the Momentive Performance Materials plant in Waterford, NY. | POLITICO NY/Jimmy Vielkind Upstate strike an early test for Trump's economic agenda

WATERFORD — An early test is taking shape for President Donald Trump here at a chemical plant on the banks of the Hudson River: Will he weigh in for the striking workers who helped vote him into office, or the executives who seem to have his ear?

The Republican president may have provided a clue Friday, when he huddled with a collection of CEOs at the White House in an advisory council chaired by Steve Schwarzman, head of the private equity giant Blackstone. At the very same time, dozens of workers picketed in a freezing wind outside the Momentive Performance Materials plant for the ninety-fourth consecutive day. They talked about the latest round of givebacks demanded by the hedge fund managers who bought the plant when General Electric spun it off in 2006.


It’s a group of managers that, until recently, included Schwarzman.

Many of the workers talked about why they voted for Trump, and said they hoped he would be true to the values of his campaign.

“He’s going to know we’re here, and what we’re fighting is corporate greed,” said Ed Halse, 56, who has worked at the plant for 27 years. “I like everything he says. I just hope he does something.”

Halse and around 700 other workers from IUE-CWA locals 81359 and 81380 went on strike on Nov. 2 when they rejected a contract offer that would have rolled back retirement benefits and retiree health care. They speak almost wistfully of the GE days, and say Momentive managers have been jabbing at workers since they took over — including an attempt to reclassify jobs that resulted in wage reductions — and loading up the plant with debt.

This kind of situation is exactly what union leaders point to in making their case for Democrats as champions of workers rights and tax policy. (The CWA endorsed Bernie Sanders in last year's primaries and then Hillary Clinton in the general election.) A union-backed group, Hedge Clippers, released a report on Schwarzman and Leon Black, CEO of Apollo Management and a majority shareholder in Momentive, juxtaposing their net worth with the lot of the workers.

But many rank-and-file workers figured that Trump had a better shot at shaking things up.

“I couldn’t believe it. I tried my best to convince ’em — I was a true Bernie guy,” said Dom Patrignani, president of Local 81359. “I respect the fact that Donald Trump was elected as president. He’s our guy, and he said a lot of things to these people that jumped from the Bernie wagon to the Trump wagon. They are all believers now of all these great things Donald Trump said to them, and I’m asking, if you really mean what you say, look what’s going on in upstate New York.”

Momentive’s flagship plant sits on 800 acres in Waterford, just north of an old village erected where the Mohawk River (and the Erie Canal) hits the Hudson, and makes silicone sealants — some for industrial use, and some you can buy at Home Depot — and quartz. It’s at the top of an old industrial area — the chromium steel spire of the Chrysler Building was forged a few miles to the south in Watervliet, and the iron hull of the USS Monitor across the river in Troy — where blue-collar jobs and the neighborhoods they fueled persist, albeit under more stress.

In 2008, Barack Obama carried Waterford, Halfmoon and the nearby city of Mechanicville by 592 votes, or 3.6 points. Trump beat Clinton in the same area by 1,094 votes — or 6.8 points.

Bob Master, the political director for the Communications Workers of America District One, said the union polled its members after the election and found that 60 percent had backed Clinton and 40 percent had backed Trump.

“In places in upstate New York and certainly among some of our white members, Trump had a real appeal. We knew that and we understand that,” he said. “The Trump narrative is very complicated. On the one hand he appealed to people’s anger at the loss of jobs and trade deals that hollowed out towns across the country. On the other hand, there was a narrative of racism and misogyny and anti-immigrant sentiment that appealed to others, and was very troubling. A lot of people, including some of our members, overlooked that because he was speaking to a lot of their frustration.”

Master said union activists handed out fliers in Lafayette Square, adjacent to the White House, during Friday’s meeting of the business council. Trump and Schwarzman wore matching red ties during a meeting that focused on taxes and trade, both men said, and then Schwarzman flew to Florida with the president on Air Force One.

A spokesman for Blackstone, Matt Anderson, said the company sold its stake in Momentive this summer and it was not one of the original buyers of the plant — and therefore not involved in earlier wage reductions. Even if Black is a more direct owner, Schwarzman is a more convenient target. The union is sending a busload of protesters to his Park Avenue home this week, and on the line in Waterford, many of the strikers knew his name.

“I would hope it would help that he’s one of Trump’s buddies and is on that board,” said Jeff McGuire, 55, who has worked at the plant for 30 years. “He’s not really creating jobs, he’s destroying them.”

McGuire was one of about a dozen workers — mostly men, mostly white, mostly over 40 and mostly wearing jeans and hoodies — picketing one of the plant’s northern entrances on Friday. They held signs and yelled “fucking scab” at vehicles entering and exiting the plant, which were delayed by around three minutes each under a tacit arrangement with security.

One man with a bullhorn taunted a line of trucks in a calm voice, reveling that caulk and cock are homophones. Workers burned scrap wood in a barrel and refueled on donated coffee, donuts and other items in a nearby hot dog stand that is doubling as the strike headquarters.

They pointed to the importance of health care given the nature of chemicals they’re handling. They also want the company to come back to the bargaining table.

Momentive spokeswoman Tina Reiber said talks broke off three weeks ago when the union presented a counter offer that “puts us significantly further apart” than a previous offer, which had been approved by other locals.

“The company has been clear that in order to ensure our sustainability and protect strong jobs, we must align health and retirement benefits with the package already in place for our other U.S.-based Momentive employees,” Reiber stated. “The company’s offer that is on the table today would accomplish this goal while continuing to provide some of the highest paid jobs in the area. Since the negotiation process began, we have bargained in good faith and welcome the opportunity to work toward a ratified agreement that meets the needs of both parties.”

At the same time, Momentive lawyers sued the union, asking a judge to restrict picketing activity they said is “endangering the safety and welfare of members of the public.”

The sides faced off in court on Friday as a plant manager, Josh Spain, testified that picketers were “harassing” him and other employers and suppliers who attempt to enter the facility. Spain said that only two trucking companies will make deliveries through the picket line, and that they were charging additional fees. He also said the strike was hurting the company’s reputation.

“It’s the [reduced] visibility, the intimidation and all of these things that create a risky, dangerous situation,” Spain testified.

Thomas Murray, a lawyer for the union, said the point of a picket — and federal laws that govern strikes — is to allow for these economic pressures.

“What the employer here is asking is the court to curtail the First Amendment rights of our members to publicize their dispute and to picket,” Murray said. “Swearing is not actionable. … People have to put their big boy pants on, and big girl pants, and come to work. If people are swearing at them that’s a price to pay for crossing a picket line.”

Saratoga County Supreme Court Justice Thomas Nolan ended Friday’s hearing by declining the company’s request to sign a temporary restraining order, and scheduling further testimony on Feb. 22.

It seems unlikely there will be a resumption of talks before the court case is decided, and so the picketers are pacing and waiting. They’re hoping Schwarzman’s meeting with Trump and press attention from outside the area — the New York Daily News featured the picket on its Friday cover — will move things along.

“Where’s the president?” Joe Higgins, a 10-year veteran of the plant, asked on Friday. “This isn’t making America great.”