Powerful Black labor leaders are sometimes lightning rods in this highly charged political environment bristling with unresolved issues of racial equity and economic parity. At times they have been known to attract every emotion from devotion and admiration to fear and loathing. Case in point, the head of the union that staged the city’s first transit strike in 25 years: TWU Local 100 President Roger Toussaint.

In a recent interview with the Amsterdam News, Toussaint candidly discussed the range of issues facing him and other Black leaders in today’s labor movement, labor’s changing demographics and how well it is handling the surge of Blacks and other workers of color in their membership and in the workforce.

Asked how are Black workers faring in today’s labor movement, Toussaint pointed to statistics showing a drop in the number of African Americans in unions has fallen some 14 percent since 2000, while white membership is down only 5.4 percent.

“The labor movement has quite a bit more work to do in terms of organizing around African-American workers,” Toussaint said. “The movement is plagued by some of the traditional challenges that continue to plague America, one of which is how much it’s willing to embrace sectors of the workforce, namely the African-American workforce.”

Toussaint isn’t the first Black head of TWU Local 100, but, he says, the others “were put in place by the old guard and their coming into power didn’t represent a move in a direction of reform. As a matter of fact, once the two others decided to figure things out for themselves and assert their role as local president, they got into trouble with their sponsors and their sponsors worked to undermine them.

“What’s so significant about my administration is that it did not come about as a result of some agreement; it came about as a result of a rank-and-file movement and it swept virtually the entire old guard out of office.”

What of Toussaint, the lightning rod? Who can forget how some elected officials stooped to name-calling at the height of the 2005 strike, branding Toussaint and his members “thugs,” or the newspaper headlines demanding: “Throw Roger from the Train,” or applauding gleefully when Judge Theodore Jones fined TWU Local 100 $2.5 million, threw Toussaint in jail and endangered union members’ right to representation by suspending automatic dues check-off, cutting the financial pipeline that helps the union protect and service its members?

The racially loaded name-calling during the strike reflected, Toussaint said, a “public insensitivity” that raised many questions, as did the fact that a few labor leaders distanced themselves from the striking union. That was ironic, Toussaint said, because of “the political significance of the stand we were taking on questions of pensions and health benefits and the future of American labor.”

After all, TWU Local 100 members were putting themselves on the frontlines of a battle other unions would be destined to fight sooner or later: To protect hard-earned pensions, hard-won health benefits and New York State’s restrictive Taylor Laws.

Pointing to the persistent criticism of a small internal faction, Toussaint slammed the attention they receive from one New York newspaper, saying, “The chief is heavily invested in trying to determine the direction of our union, instead of the members.” Toussaint pointed to the paper’s persistent criticism of others, including DC 37 Executive Director Lilian Roberts and former Teamster 237 head Carl Haynes, indicating that it’s ironic that the staff of the paper is non-union.

“They set themselves up as the self-appointed arbiter of the direction the labor movement should go and the judge over members of the labor movement,” he added, charging that the paper has “become increasingly pro-management.”

In spite of the slings and arrows of his opponents, Toussaint is optimistic. “Things are going reasonably well when it comes to the current campaign to encourage union members to pay their dues,” he said.

In fact, he is determined to turn this situation to an opportunity by “using the challenge of collecting dues ourselves as an opportunity to get closer to the members and redefine the organization and strengthening the organization. We hope that out of this challenging situation we come out on top,” he added.

The unity his members have shown in trying times is as much a testament of their ability to stay focused as it is to what has been accomplished on his watch. He said, “Our members’ frustration with the MTA is a great unifier. People have had enough of the MTA, and everyone was united and sensed that this was an opportunity to give them a swift kick in the behind and stand up and get respect once and for all.”

Then too, there are the numerous ways his administration has promoted members’ participation in the union. Toussaint said it’s “a question of what union democracy consists of. Does it consist of having a debating society for intellectuals who have wandered into the labor movement, or is union democracy about reestablishing ownership of the labor organizations around union members and multiplying their participation in activities?”

To prove his point, Toussaint points to what has been accomplished on his watch: He cut staff salaries so they don’t make more than the members, equalized pensions, published a newspaper for the first time in the history of Local 100, instituted a child care and training and upgrading fund that members flock to, instituted a continuous round of trainings for shop stewards and created a host of activities like Black History Month, Women’s Day, Irish Day, Latino Day, Indian Day, Russian Day, Italian Day and more.

“The level of participation of the membership in the activities of the union is one of the surest measures of democracy within the organization,” Toussaint said. “I could go on and on with what we have done. Of course, there’s a lot more to be done,” he added.

Still, Roger Toussaint holds his own, whether grappling with the impact of his own image or the challenges created by shifting demographics in the labor movement or staying focused in a world made increasingly more complex by the politics of race and class. And his struggle continues.