AFL-CIO/CTW Agree To Coordinate On Political Action
ShareThis leaves many questions yet to be resolved and pol. directors have yet to figure out how this will work in reality, but... good news, generally, for Dems. Said one pol. dir: "This has taken a tremendous amount of work."
AFL-CIO president John Sweeney and Change to Win chair Anna Burger today announced that they have reached a tentative agreement on a plan for coordination of member mobilization activity for the 2006 election year."The entire labor movement is united by the desire to make working people's issues the country's priorities this election year, and we are taking all the necessary steps to effectively coordinate our efforts toward this end," said Sweeney and Burger.
The AFL-CIO and Change to Win will create a National Labor Coordinating Committee (NLCC) to be chaired by Gerald McEntee, AFL-CIO political committee chair and president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, and vice-chaired by Edgar Romney, secretary-treasurer of Change to Win and executive vice president of UNITE HERE. Political directors and staff from the organizations will work in close collaboration on every aspect of the program, and the organizations will share the costs of joint activities.
As part of the agreement, Change to Win releases its affiliates to participate in state and local central labor bodies, and AFL-CIO President Sweeney will recommend to the AFL-CIO Executive Council that the United Farm Workers be eligible to participate in state and local bodies.
One official affiliated with a Change to Win union said the two labor coalitions would only coordinate on races where they are of a like mind. Two examples cited where they would unite: Sherrod Brown in OH SEN and Bob Casey in PA SEN.
Other contests where there may be some conflict could include ME and RI SEN, this person said. Change to Win is more favorably disposed to supporting the GOP incumbents in those states.
As for whether top Dems pushed for this election-year reunification, our source would only say that "concerns were expressed" by Dem officials.
Another CTW official, exec. dir. Greg Tarpinian, said the agreement "is the result of several months of back and forth on how we would work together. And there were concessions on both sides."
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