By Doug Cunningham
According to an unnamed source privy to the deliberations the AFL-CIO Executive Council will not be endorsing a presidential candidate in the primaries. Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Jim Webb and Martin O’Malley all made their cases for AFL-CIO support this week. The only union to endorse a presidential candidate so far is the American Federation of Teachers declaring for Hillary Clinton. Mike Huckabee was the only GOP candidate at the AFL-CIOExecutive meeting this week. And he said he doesn’t consider unions and the Republican Party to be enemies.
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With the labor contract expiring this weekend, Verizon is demanding concessions from its 39,000 CWA and IBEW union workers, despite revenue of $127 billion and 2014 profit of $9.6 billion. IBEW Local 2222’s Myles Calvey says a strike has been authorized if no agreement is reached.
[Myles Calvey]: “What we’re lookin’ for here is job security. We definitely understand some of the issues goin’ forward with health care, but we need improvements on the pension, we don’t need elimination of the pension.”
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Southern California Port truck drivers backed by the Teamsters are seeking the political support of the Long Beach City Council in their campaign to be reclassified as employees and end wage theft. Monica Lopez reports.
[Eric Tate]: “You took the time to hear us tonight. Now we need the entire Long Beach City Council to open their ears and their hearts to the injustice of the drivers.”
Local 8-4-8 Teamster Eric Tate delivered the port truckers’ main message of the evening— support driver wage theft claims and help to open a dialogue with the Ports of LA and Long Beach.
In recent weeks, port drivers and Teamsters launched another strike in LA, and testified before a Senate subcommittee in Savannah on worker misclassification.
At Tuesday’s hearing in Long Beach, supporters like Scarlet DeLeon with Korean Immigrant Workers of Los Angeles said that until last year she’d never seen a paycheck like that of a port truck driver.
[Scarlet DeLeon]: “Last year we filed about 20 claims on behalf of port drivers. Checks would begin at one thousand, but after deductions the works would cash in a few hundred if that. Many times these checks would come out to negative amounts. These are not contracted workers. They do not make their own schedules nor do they own their own trucks.”
Monica Lopez. Workers Independent News. Long Beach.
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On the 50th anniversary of Medicare, Nancy Altman, co-director of Social Security Works, is joining the progressive/labor call for expansion. not cutting, of both Medicare and Social Security.
[Nancy Altman]: “Poll after poll shows that – by margins like 80 percent – believe these programs are more important than ever. They want to see them increase, not reduced. These programs are extremely affordable. We are the wealthiest nation in the world. And we are at the wealthiest point in our history. There is no question we can afford Medicare as it now is, Social Security as it now is, but expanded programs.”
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As New Jersey Governor Chris Christie runs for president he leaves a huge public pensions mess behind in the state he governs. Three public pension funds are suing New Jersey for billions in damages for failing to fully fund pensions. New Jersey Education Association President Wendell Steinhauer says public pensions are sustainable in New Jersey, but the state has to pay its share and meet its obligation to workers who earn their pensions with decades of labor.
[Wendell Steinhauer]: “Yes, they are sustainable. There’s just one key to doing it. And that is the state funding their share of it.”