A total of 400,000 Minnesotans – just over 16 percent of the workforce – is represented by labor unions. Union members range from government workers, teachers and construction tradespeople to workers in health care, hospitality, taconite mining, sugar refining and many other industries.
Though only 16 percent of the workforce, exit polls in both the 2004 and 2006 elections indicated union members are twice as likely to vote as their non-union counterparts – and they also motivate their family and friends to participate. The influence of the union vote makes this year\'s effort by unions across the state especially significant.
"The tide is finally turning. Union members realize how bad the conditions are in this country. Union members are angry about how conditions have deteriorated over the past eight years," explained Bobby Kasper, a Laborers union representative. "Finally, though, there is excitement in the air about taking our country back and bringing back the union quality-of-life. To do this – we need all union members on the doors, on the phones and leafleting at worksites up until the election!"
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| Union members crowded the UAW Local 879 hall in St. Paul to watch the final presidential debate on a big screen. Workday Minnesota photo |
On one recent day, members of the Bakery Confectionery Tobacco and Grain Millers union leafleted plants in Minnesota\'s Red River Valley where sugar beets are refined into table sugar.
"When you\'re passing out leaflets at your own factory, you can make it personal," noted coordinator Mark Froemke. "You know them and you can talk to them better."
On the same day, workers from Education Minnesota, IBEW, the Machinists and other unions leafleted the Electrolux plant in St. Cloud. Meanwhile, dozens of activists called other union members through phone banks at union halls in St. Paul, Minneapolis, Mankato and Rochester and on the Iron Range.
Watching the debate
Some 300 people packed the United Auto Workers Local 879 hall in St. Paul to watch the final debate between presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama. They alternately applauded and booed, cheering when Obama promised to stop tax breaks for corporations that move jobs overseas and jeering McCain\'s comment that the problems of free trade could be solved by providing more retraining for workers.
Frequent comments by both candidates about Obama\'s encounter with "Joe the plumber," an Ohio voter, elicited heavy laughter. The plumber, Joe Wurzelbacher, claimed to be an undecided voter and quizzed Obama earlier this month about his tax plan.
However, it turns out Wurzelbacher does not hold a plumber\'s license and is a member of the Associated Builders and Contractors, an anti-union trade group that has endorsed McCain, according to the United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices of the Plumbing and Pipe Fitting Industry.
Still, workers gathered at the UAW hall were glad the debate had shifted to jobs and the effect of Bush administration policies on working Americans. The day of the debate, 760 Local 879 members employed at the Ford Twin Cities Assembly Plant learned they would be laid off for five weeks starting at Thanksgiving. Their plant, which produces the Ford Ranger, is slated to close in 2011.
Reaching every voter
The debate-watching party and similar events boost the spirits of activists, who are engaged in the hard work of knocking on doors and making phone calls, organizers said. The effort will continue non-stop through Nov. 4, capped by a massive mobilization to get out the vote on Election Day.
The focus in Minnesota is to win the state for Obama, elect DFL candidate Al Franken to the U.S. Senate and labor-endorsed candidates to the U.S. House of Representatives, Minnesota House and local offices.
Minnesota is one of several battleground states targeted nationally by both major labor federations, the AFL-CIO and Change to Win.
"We will spend tens of millions of dollars and thousands of volunteer hours to contact members at their worksites, homes and communities every day between now and Nov. 4 to make sure Barack Obama is elected president and pro-worker majorities are put in the United States Congress," explained Anna Burger, chair of Change to Win.
"With a comprehensive mail, phone and canvass effort in 13 battleground states, including a full-time, coordinated member-to-member canvass with 1,500 member canvassers, more than 10 million pieces of direct mail and 20 million phone calls, the unions of Change to Win will educate our members and turn out an historic vote this November."
In addition to its massive Labor 2008 campaign, the AFL-CIO is working in nine states – Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Missouri, Virginia, Wisconsin, New Mexico, Colorado and Nevada – to educate citizens about their voting rights and help prevent voting rights violations.
This report includes information from the Minnesota Labor 2008 blog and the AFL-CIO and Change to Win websites.
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| Members of the National Association of Letter Carriers cheered U.S. Senate candidate Al Franken, one of several labor-endorsed candidates who spoke prior to the screening of the presidential debate at the UAW Local 879 hall. Workday Minnesota photo |
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A total of 400,000 Minnesotans – just over 16 percent of the workforce – is represented by labor unions. Union members range from government workers, teachers and construction tradespeople to workers in health care, hospitality, taconite mining, sugar refining and many other industries.
Though only 16 percent of the workforce, exit polls in both the 2004 and 2006 elections indicated union members are twice as likely to vote as their non-union counterparts – and they also motivate their family and friends to participate. The influence of the union vote makes this year\’s effort by unions across the state especially significant.
"The tide is finally turning. Union members realize how bad the conditions are in this country. Union members are angry about how conditions have deteriorated over the past eight years," explained Bobby Kasper, a Laborers union representative. "Finally, though, there is excitement in the air about taking our country back and bringing back the union quality-of-life. To do this – we need all union members on the doors, on the phones and leafleting at worksites up until the election!"
|
| Union members crowded the UAW Local 879 hall in St. Paul to watch the final presidential debate on a big screen.
Workday Minnesota photo |
Kasper\’s enthusiasm is amplified many times in communities across the state, according to daily reports on the AFL-CIO Minnesota Labor 2008 blog.
On one recent day, members of the Bakery Confectionery Tobacco and Grain Millers union leafleted plants in Minnesota\’s Red River Valley where sugar beets are refined into table sugar.
"When you\’re passing out leaflets at your own factory, you can make it personal," noted coordinator Mark Froemke. "You know them and you can talk to them better."
On the same day, workers from Education Minnesota, IBEW, the Machinists and other unions leafleted the Electrolux plant in St. Cloud. Meanwhile, dozens of activists called other union members through phone banks at union halls in St. Paul, Minneapolis, Mankato and Rochester and on the Iron Range.
Watching the debate
Some 300 people packed the United Auto Workers Local 879 hall in St. Paul to watch the final debate between presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama. They alternately applauded and booed, cheering when Obama promised to stop tax breaks for corporations that move jobs overseas and jeering McCain\’s comment that the problems of free trade could be solved by providing more retraining for workers.
Frequent comments by both candidates about Obama\’s encounter with "Joe the plumber," an Ohio voter, elicited heavy laughter. The plumber, Joe Wurzelbacher, claimed to be an undecided voter and quizzed Obama earlier this month about his tax plan.
However, it turns out Wurzelbacher does not hold a plumber\’s license and is a member of the Associated Builders and Contractors, an anti-union trade group that has endorsed McCain, according to the United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices of the Plumbing and Pipe Fitting Industry.
Still, workers gathered at the UAW hall were glad the debate had shifted to jobs and the effect of Bush administration policies on working Americans. The day of the debate, 760 Local 879 members employed at the Ford Twin Cities Assembly Plant learned they would be laid off for five weeks starting at Thanksgiving. Their plant, which produces the Ford Ranger, is slated to close in 2011.
Reaching every voter
The debate-watching party and similar events boost the spirits of activists, who are engaged in the hard work of knocking on doors and making phone calls, organizers said. The effort will continue non-stop through Nov. 4, capped by a massive mobilization to get out the vote on Election Day.
The focus in Minnesota is to win the state for Obama, elect DFL candidate Al Franken to the U.S. Senate and labor-endorsed candidates to the U.S. House of Representatives, Minnesota House and local offices.
Minnesota is one of several battleground states targeted nationally by both major labor federations, the AFL-CIO and Change to Win.
"We will spend tens of millions of dollars and thousands of volunteer hours to contact members at their worksites, homes and communities every day between now and Nov. 4 to make sure Barack Obama is elected president and pro-worker majorities are put in the United States Congress," explained Anna Burger, chair of Change to Win.
"With a comprehensive mail, phone and canvass effort in 13 battleground states, including a full-time, coordinated member-to-member canvass with 1,500 member canvassers, more than 10 million pieces of direct mail and 20 million phone calls, the unions of Change to Win will educate our members and turn out an historic vote this November."
In addition to its massive Labor 2008 campaign, the AFL-CIO is working in nine states – Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Missouri, Virginia, Wisconsin, New Mexico, Colorado and Nevada – to educate citizens about their voting rights and help prevent voting rights violations.
This report includes information from the Minnesota Labor 2008 blog and the AFL-CIO and Change to Win websites.
|
| Members of the National Association of Letter Carriers cheered U.S. Senate candidate Al Franken, one of several labor-endorsed candidates who spoke prior to the screening of the presidential debate at the UAW Local 879 hall.
Workday Minnesota photo |