Posted on 03/10/2016 1:38:19 PM PST by xzins
The support of big labor is never very much in question when election time rolls around. Labor unions remain the quintessential Super PACs of the Democrats, just as they have for generations. This season has had a few bumps and blemishes along the way as the various unions debated whether they would support Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders, but when the dust finally settles there is nobody with any experience in this area who is worried theyll suddenly be supporting Ted Cruz. Still, the job of union honcho Richard Trumka has become increasingly complicated by the presence of Donald Trump on the opposite side of the field. Hes not so much worried about raising money for Hillary as he is the possibility that his own members will bolt the stables and wind up supporting The Donald if he secures the nomination. (Washington Post)
Richard Trumka, the president of the AFL-CIO, thought hed have a pretty simple job in 2016: turn out his 12.7 million union members to support the Democratic presidential nominee.
But it turns out Trumkas task may be very different and perhaps more difficult: preventing a significant share of union households which typically favor Democrats in elections from defecting to Donald Trump if hes the GOP standard-bearer.
If left unattended, the anger and the frustration [Trump has] tapped into will carry the day, Trumka warned Monday in an interview with the Washington Post. But when you give working-class people the facts, I think he falls apart. Hes a house of cards.
Trumka has an anti-Trump plan, the first parts of which will roll out next week: educate voters about what he says is Trumps history of anti-worker, anti-union policies.
Trumkas situation isnt really as unusual as the media coverage would lead you to believe. Theres no question that union leadership always supports the Democrats up and down the line, nor that they extract dues from all their members and pour that into Democratic campaigns rather than spending it on providing benefits to the workers they ostensibly represent. This is all well known.
But living where I do I have some history with this particular subject and the number of votes they generate is never quite as substantial as they like to announce. Yes, Im sure they get a majority of union members to vote with the union label by brainwashing them with constant propaganda and social pressure, but its nowhere near as monolithic as they would have you believe. I personally know quite a few union members in our area who consistently vote Republican, but they only speak of it quietly in small, trusted groups of friends. You wont see any GOP bumper stickers on their trucks or find them showing up at Republican candidate rallies because they value their jobs. (And disloyalty to the union Democratic line will see you on a very different line at the unemployment office in short order.) But in the privacy of the voting booth they wind up voting with their heads, not their time cards.
The curious aspect of this phenomenon is that these are a subset of voters who never show up in the primaries, dont add to the GOP registered voter totals and rarely answer the calls of pollsters with their actual intentions. Its not a huge volume, but they certainly exist. Trumpka has reason to be worried and I would suggest that its not just Trump who should be on his mind. There are plenty of them who would vote for Cruz or Rubio or Kasich as well.
Trump vs. Trumka? You can’t make this stuff up.
I’m sorry - The Washington elite establishment has declared they will do ANYTHING to kill Trump’s chances to seek these voters!
They, you see, know more than anybody else. /sarchasm - that gaping whole between a liberal and the truth
From everything I’ve read and personally heard and hear, TRUMP is getting the majority of the big labor vote.
Trumka that apparatchik can't assimilate all his minions into his Borg anymore.
Then again he isn't a 7 of 9,
and even if he was They still ain't gonna pull the lever for she who reminds them of their X mother in law.
They like to work, and get paid.
Perhaps the union rank and file are starting to learn that the purpose of unions is to improve the workers situation at all levels. This means not just directly from their employer, but helping their employer to get them more work, and helping the US to keep more jobs here, for Americans, rather than exporting them, or allowing in vast numbers of immigrants, legal and illegal, or issuing work visas to anyone and everyone.
Instead, the union spends most of its time making its leaders wealthy, and screwing the rank and file, and supporting Democrats who screw them, as well as RINO Republicans, who are screwing them as fast as they can.
It should be no surprise that Trump is popular among the rank and file. He is proposing what their union leaders and government are *supposed* to be doing, but aren’t.
Not worried about defections to Cruz, Rubio, Kasich?
Union won’t.
They don’t like Kasich in Ohio, and Cruz/Rubio aren’t looking like winners so far.
It wouldn’t surprise me.
They HATE open borders, illegal immigration, and legal immigrants taking American jobs with people already out of work. They HATE American jobs being shipped out to other countries.
So, that automatically kills Clinton, Rubio, and Cruz is suspect.
Democrats could always count on Big Labor for votes and really took them granted. They keep on pushing liberal social programs/welfare/illegals which your average joe six pack either doesn’t care about or actively dislikes. Now instead of trying to get these voters the republicans took the side of big business and act like a bunch of modern day pinkertons. They were a large pool of working class people whose cultural views are probably more inline with conservatism than any progressive pro-homo liberal claptrap.
The new Democrat Party coalition is made up of ruling elites, the billionaires they answer to , government workers, illegal aliens and welfare recipients.
“You wont see any GOP bumper stickers on their trucks or find them showing up at Republican candidate rallies because they value their jobs. (And disloyalty to the union Democratic line will see you on a very different line at the unemployment office in short order.)”
Surprise, surprise.
Aren’t Trump and Hillary the same? That’s what the perfect conservatives keep saying? so, what difference does it make now anyway, right?
That will be a thing of beauty. And I do believe it can happen.
They did that when they killed the Keystone pipeline, fought shale oil, fought coal,etc. Paybacks are ...
Dem turnout way down. GOP turnout though the roof. Dems changing parties to vote in primaries. Union members aka Reagan Democrats defecting to Trump. Trumka can’t stop squat. Trump will win 40 states.
46,000 Pennsylvania Democrats have changed their registration to Republican since the start of the year.
And it ain’t because they’re in love with Pat Toomey.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.