Photo via DDOT.

As if D.C.’s streetcar project isn’t beleaguered enough, the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) is now claiming that nine employees were fired for union organizing and calling on WMATA to take over.

ATU alleges that RATP Dev McDonald Transit (RDMT), the contractor that operates the streetcar program, and The Midtown Group, a staffing company, fired the employees—who make up nearly a third of the streetcar’s staff—in retaliation for being involved in a union organizing drive.

The D.C. Department of Transportation, RDMT and The Midtown Group did not respond to requests for comment.

“Not only have the streetcar managers failed in almost every aspect of the development of this new system, but they want to muzzle any criticism by their employees whose wages and benefits they seek to suppress,” said ATU International President Larry Hanley in a statement.

Hanley said that ATU has filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board.

ATU—whose Local 689 is Metro’s largest union—is also calling on WMATA to take over the project. “It is preposterous that there is a streetcar or a Circulator bus that is not run by WMATA,” Hanley tells DCist. He argues that the city chose to work with private contractors to make it more difficult for workers to organize.

So what does WMATA think about adding another behemoth project to its to-do list?

“As this is a District project, we have no position on the matter,” said Morgan Dye, a WAMTA spokeswoman.