Posts tagged Democrat
The real impact of the Teamsters’ non-endorsement
September 20, 2024 // “Union endorsements are valuable because they usually come with access to resources, particularly volunteers to knock on doors and work phone banks,” Squire said. “Leadership may be able to persuade some members to vote the way they would like, but the real value is in campaign assistance.” Besides the setback of having fewer volunteers, there’s also some possibility that the non-endorsement could sway non-union voters sympathetic to labor issues.
Teamsters without endorsement as members back Trump over Harris
September 19, 2024 // Rank-and-file members of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters back former President Donald Trump over Vice President Kamala Harris by a nearly 2-to-1 margin, according to a new poll, though the union says it will not back a candidate this election cycle. The Teamsters union, which represents truckers and UPS drivers, released internal polling of its membership Wednesday, finding that 58% of members support Trump compared to 31% who back Harris.
Op-Ed: Labor unions are turning into roach motels for generations of workers
September 17, 2024 // So, if you're stuck in a union, the odds are you probably didn't vote for that union to be there -- someone employed by the company years ago voted for them based on different circumstances, but you have to live with the consequences as an employee of a company with a union stuck onto them like a barnacle. Only five percent of workers throughout the entire private sector voted for the union that supposedly represents them. Everyone else is their hostage, paying the extorted union dues whether they like or not, as a sort of ransom, yet never, ever, getting released.
Trump and Harris, with starkly different records on labor issues, are both courting union voters
September 5, 2024 // By comparison, two days after taking office in 2021, Biden issued an executive order that established masking guidelines, and his administration made health and safety protocols on the job during the rest of the COVID-19 pandemic a high priority. Compared with the inaction by the Trump administration during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Biden administration has been more active in proposing health and safety measures. For example, in July 2024 it proposed rules designed to protect some 36 million workers from health risks associated with extreme heat. After a period for written comments, public hearings will be held on the bill. When Trump tried cutting OSHA funding for 2018 by approximately US$10 million, Congress blocked his efforts. The Biden administration is seeking a 3.7% increase in OSHA’s budget for the 2025 fiscal year.
Teamsters president said address to GOP convention was to highlight workers, not to endorse Republicans
September 3, 2024 // When asked on CBS News’s “Face the Nation” if he spoke at the convention because he feels former President Trump has been more pro-labor than any other GOP candidates, O’Brien said, “No, not at all.” “I spoke there because it was the ability to highlight how important we are. It was the ability to call out the people, the corporate elitist who forget who built this country, the American workers,” O’Brien continued. “You know, people like to, you know, have their own opinions on why we were there, but I was there to talk about the American workers.”
JD Vance receives received a mix of boos, applause at firefighters’ convention in Boston
August 30, 2024 // There was applause. There were boos. But Vance asked critics to give him a chance. "Sounds like we got some fans and some haters. That's OK," he said. "Let's listen to what I have to say here." Vance's pitch to the largest firefighter union was fairly straightforward: Firefighters, he claimed, are worse off than they were before President Biden took office.
Harris girds for battle with Trump over union workers and their Big Labor bosses
August 28, 2024 // Ultimately, the labor vote is likely to follow the candidate workers feel can best address the economic concerns of the working class. Harris will almost certainly win the labor vote, but what will really matter is Trump's ability to cut into her margins with appeals to working-class voters on issues like immigration and trade.
Praise of Kamala Harris, Tim Walz written by nonunion staff during teachers strike
August 15, 2024 // In an internet post this week, the staffers accused NEA management of using people to take over the duties of union workers to compile an Aug. 6 endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris’ choice of former NEA member Tim Walz as her running mate. The NEA has been stuck in a labor dispute with its staff union for months. Sent through Progressive Newswire, the press release includes the name and email address of NEA communications specialist Staci Maiers as a contact. She said management froze her out of the inbox last month after she helped organize a July 5 picket line that shut down the union’s annual assembly in Philadelphia.
The Cases Against Sectoral Bargaining: The Practical Case
August 11, 2024 // The effect of sectoral bargaining on union corruption would be unclear. Scholars of union corruption have blamed enterprise bargaining combined with union monopoly representation for America’s unusually high levels of labor racketeering. There is truth to this, but it is also not the case that American unions involved in industries with more-sectoral-style approaches are “cleaner.” The New York City garment industry, which was exempted from various Taft-Hartley regulations on union conduct, was believed by the federal government to have been Mob influenced as recently as the 1990s. More recently, the United Auto Workers, which conducts a sort of pseudo-sectoral bargaining with the unionized Detroit Three automakers by “patterning” its contracts, was forced into a regime change after the largest union corruption scandal of the 21st century. Putting more power in the hands of America’s long-standing class of union officials, who are known for having their hands in the cookie jar, certainly is not an obvious approach to reducing or surveilling corruption in organized labor.
Matt Kane: Better For America Ep 298 | Vinnie Vernuccio (Podcast)
August 6, 2024 // In mid July, Teamsters President Sean O’Brien addressed the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. It was the first time that a leader of the union ever addressed the GOP convention. However, the Teamsters have also requested a speaking slot at the DNC later this month, meaning a lot is still up in the air regarding their support. Vinnie Vernuccio, the president and co-founder of the Institute for the American Worker joined Matt Kane on the Better For America podcast to share what he makes of this notworthy development. Vernuccio says that while O’Brien’s presence was significant, he feels his messaging “whiffed,” as his remarks could have been mistaken for ones targeted at a DEMOCRAT convention. Vernuccio also wonders whether the Teamsters are truly considering a Republican endorsement, or if they are simply hedging their bets due to their expectation that President Trump will win the November election.