Why The New York Times Needle Could Break On Election Day

Hundreds of tech workers went on strike early Monday morning at The New York Times, threatening to push their work stoppage into Election Day if they don’t see progress on a collective bargaining agreement.
The walkout could disrupt what should be a monster traffic day for the paper of record on Tuesday, when all news organizations want their products running smoothly for readers. The tech workers on strike include the many engineers who handle website and app glitches in real time as polls close and viewership surges.
The employee union said the strike could even impact the functioning of the Times’ famous and gut-churning Needle, which shows the presidential candidates’ vacillating odds of winning according to the latest results.
“It could and it will,” predicted Benjamin Harnett, a union shop steward and principal engineer at the Times who’s worked through three presidential elections. “There is a complex set of data pipes and systems driving the Needle. … Any one of those things could have a weird glitch.”
The workers unionized as the New York Times Tech Guild in March 2022 and are still trying to negotiate their first contract. (Newsroom employees have had union representation for decades.) The union said it hasn’t reached agreements with management on some core concerns, including job protections, hybrid work arrangements, and how to address what the union said are pay equities among membership.
“We’re expecting a tremendous surge in traffic, probably record-breaking for The New York Times tomorrow. We’re looking at our systems having to run at 20x or 30x capacity.”
The workers are on what’s known as an “unfair labor practice” strike, walking off the job alleging illegal behavior by their employer. They claim the paper has implemented a return-to-office mandate without bargaining over it and tried to “intimidate” members by interrogating them about the upcoming strike.
“The Tech Guild is asking readers to honor the digital picket line and not play popular NYT Games such as Wordle and Connections as well as not use the NYT Cooking app,” the union said in a statement Monday.
Danielle Rhoades Ha, a Times spokesperson, said the paper was “looking forward” to reaching a “fair contract,” but that it was “disappointed” workers went on strike when they did.
“We’re in one of the most consequential periods of coverage for our readers and have robust plans in place to ensure that we are able to fulfill our mission and serve our readers,” Rhoades Ha said. “While we respect the union’s right to engage in protected actions, we’re disappointed that colleagues would strike at this time, which is both unnecessary and at odds with our mission.”
Although the digital picket line does not include news stories, Harnett said the strike could certainly impact how the Times delivers news to readers on Election Day. He said the paper would probably try using managers and consultants to fill the roles of strikers, but he doubted they could do so adequately amid a traffic surge. He said managers have also tried to get union members to cross the picket line by assuring them they could do so discreetly.
“We’re expecting a tremendous surge in traffic, probably record-breaking for The New York Times tomorrow,” he said. “We’re looking at our systems having to run at 20x or 30x capacity.”
He said engineers try to anticipate the problems that might arise, but that the issues they face on a night like Tuesday tend to be “unexpected.” He also said the roles they work in are not so interchangeable — it could take an engineer “hours” to get up to speed on a system they don’t customarily work with.
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If the strike continues, Harnett said, those workers won’t all be in the same room eating pizza and handling glitches as the world eagerly clicks for the latest results from battleground states.
“For each system there is a small number of people who are clued in and able to fix this,” he said. “And most of those people are going to be on strike.”
The union representing newsroom employees has told its own members that they have a contractual right to refuse to perform the work of tech workers who are on strike.
Jenny Vrentas, a reporter on the Times’ business desk and a shop steward in the newsroom union, said the strike was a “reflection of the company’s choices,” not employees’.
“Anyone who’s talked to our tech colleagues knows they don’t take this lightly,” Vrentas said. “To see the company repeatedly stonewall them, treat them like they don’t have a union, and drag negotiations out for so long, it should never have gotten to this point.”