well unionized airport workers are launching a fullscale campaign in their fight for higher wages continuing to invite influential political leaders to join them on the job and see what their lives are like working for some of the world's largest airline companies this time first lady Tammy Murphy joined members of 32bj SEIU at newark's Terminal B during their multi-state push to improve industry standards and their pay Raven Santana reports from airport gates to baggage handling Derek Rose is in charge of making sure anyone who uses a wheelchair gets to where they have to go on time he walks pushes and picks up luggage eight hours a day five days a week and while Stone loves his job he doesn't love his pay the expense the expense and how everything's going up everything's going up food and rent and public service and you know and car note everything go up everything go up except our wages which is why he had a special guests Shadow him today first lady Tammy Murphy she here uhhuh you got to go on the board here a a692 I think it's really important I think that particularly in this day and age we got to understand um how other people are living and how they're making ends meet and what challenges they have and you know I think that that um it's it's really easy especially these days to just look past people and not really communicate and put yourself in their shoes the first lady who is in report of increasing wages for workers shadowed stone for a behind the-scenes walking tour of his job here in Terminal A at New York Liberty International Airport she began the day at Stone's home in Orange and followed him on his commute to work at one point even pitching in with the luggage handling Derek has worked as a wheelchair attendant in Newark Airport since 2012 and has also been a member of 32bj SEIU for more than 4 years the union is demanding the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey raise wages for thousands of airport workers to $25 an hour by 2030 along with the protection of health benefits and paid leave the current minimum wage at Port Authority airports which includes nework LaGuardia and JFK is $19 an hour I remember fighting with Phil for minimum wage to be increased to $15 you know I mean and that a lot of people around us were saying you're going to put us out of business and this is not the fact of the matter is you can't hire anybody today fr under $15 and it's it's it's not a living wage it's not dignified it's not respectful um we need to make sure that that that that everybody's able to participate in our economy it's not like this is a an isolated case this is one piece of a bigger the union says Airlines have seen substantial multi-billion dollar profits in the past year while workers wages and benefits are lagging behind Stone says his situation is becoming extremely challenging as he's expressed his financial strain when it comes to keeping up with his nearly 2,000 rent and his $100 a month commute times where like um my wife had medication we couldn't like we couldn't pay for it she had to like SK skip days cuz she couldn't pay for it and you know that that it's not a good thing I can do the math you can do the math if you are paid $19 an hour and you work eight hour days uh 5 days a week for 50 weeks a year you can calculate what that means Stone says in addition to living paycheck to paycheck the work is also physically demanding so I wake up in the morning at 7:35 I catch the bus at 8:45 I'm downtown I got catch two buses so I'm downtown and get that bus about 9 9 something and then I'm then I'm here till 6:30 or 7:30 almost 7:30 then I'm like I'm like tired just want to shower and sleep we all complain about costs we all complain about delays we all complain about everything but it's real people like Derek and his colleagues who during the pandemic kept the airports running the first lady says she now plans on visiting hotel workers in Atlantic City for NJ Spotlight news I'm Raven Santana support for the business report is provided by Riverview Jazz presenting the 11th annual Jersey City Jazz Festival May 29th to June 2nd event details including performance schedules and locations are online at Jersey City jazz festival.com