2002 CWA Legislative-Political Conference: Members Prepare to Do Battle for Working Families

At the first CWA Legislative-Political Conference since the Sept. 11 tragedies, there was a palpable sense of patriotism.

You could hear the pride as participants recited the Pledge of Allegiance, the resolve as they applauded the war effort and the passion as they committed themselves to fighting harder than ever for America’s workers, children, seniors and people in need.

“We are in the war against terrorism to protect our basic freedoms,” CWA President Morton Bahr said in an opening day speech March 3. “Those freedoms include the right to organize, to belong to a union, to bargain, to have a voice on the job and to strike when necessary.”

They also include the right to disagree with America’s leaders, Bahr and other distinguished speakers reminded the audience of 600 CWA members who came to Washington, D.C., from across the country to learn and lobby.

“When it comes to defeating the terrorists, when it comes to stopping any repeat of the barbaric acts of Sept. 11, united we stand — as CWA members, as trade unionists and as Americans,” CWA Secretary-Treasurer Barbara Easterling said. “But standing behind the president in the battle on terrorism does not mean rolling over when it comes to workers’ rights.”

In a fiery speech, Sen. Paul Wellstone (D-Minn.) said the very issues that anti-worker forces in Washington are pushing aside — job security, improved health care, better schools and other working class, family-friendly issues — are the real keys to the nation’s security.

“I’m the son of a Jewish immigrant from the Ukraine, who fled persecution. I was taught to love this country,” Wellstone said, his voice rising. “I don’t give any ground on patriotism. I don’t give any ground on national security. But I will tell you something: Part of the definition of national security is the security of local communities, where people have jobs and decent wages and health care and education.”

Election 2002
National leaders invited to speak addressed pension security, fair trade, the federal budget, election reform, the need to expand access to the Internet and other pressing issues whose fate will largely be determined by the outcome of November’s midterm election.

“Your leadership and political activism will shape the future,” said House Minority Whip Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). “Whether it is economic policy to ensure opportunity for working people, or enforcing labor laws through OSHA and the NLRB for worker safety and the right to organize, or restoring ergonomic protections for repetitive motion injuries on the job, we must set the agenda.”

The U.S. Senate effectively is split 50-50 and the U.S. House is six seats away from a working-family takeover — presently there are 222 Republicans, 211 Democrats and two Independents. The slim margins are unique, national political analyst Charlie Cook said, noting that the Senate hasn’t been so close since 1956 and the House hasn’t been as close since 1954. The last time both were as tight simultaneously was 1932.

“If you’ve got the ground troops, that will make all the difference in the world,” Cook said. “In a midterm election when turnout is low, it’s who gets the people out.”

Steve Rosenthal, AFL-CIO political director, said corporations spent nine times more than unions in the 1996 election and 15 times more in 2000. Loopholes in pending campaign finance reform could increase the margin to 20-to-1 this year. But businesses are learning that winning elections isn’t just a matter of outspending the opposition, he said.

Businesses are starting to lobby workers to vote the company’s way, he said, quoting from a Wall Street Journal piece that said, “Stung by labor’s impressive grassroots efforts in recent elections, business groups are planning to ask employers nationwide to help mobilize support for a business-friendly agenda.”

But don’t be fooled by company rhetoric, Wellstone said, poking fun at the spin business boosters put on their anti-worker campaigns. “They brought a bill to the floor to overturn the 40-hour work week. They called it the ‘Family Friendly Workplace Act.’ They brought another bill to the floor to enable companies to choose who negotiates for employees. We call it a company union. They call it the ‘TEAM’ act. They tried to bring a bill to gut OSHA. They called that the ‘SAFE’ act,” he said.

CWA Executive Vice President Larry Cohen said it’s imperative that workers put their elected or would-be officials on the spot. “We will ask, ‘Which side are you on?’ Are you with Enron’s Ken Lay, Global Crossing’s Gary Winnick, GE’s Jeff Immelt and IBM’s Louis Gerstner,” he said, naming executives who’ve made off with tens of millions of dollars at workers’ expense. “Or will you really stand up for the majority in your district who go to work each day concerned about their jobs and their families?”

Rep. Joe Baca (D-Calif.) said anti-worker candidates are good at putting on a show for union members and minority voters at election time, but quickly abandon them once the votes are counted.

“They come to the Latino community and they want to have a fiesta,” Baca said. “They want to have photos with us. But yet they don’t include us in that process. They don’t take care of our issues. They’re not a voice for us.”

In addition to 34 Senate seats and all 435 House seats up for grabs in November, 36 states have races for governor this fall. Presently there are 27 Republican governors, 21 Democrats and two Independents. But pro-worker candidates are making headway.

Both governors elected in 2001 — Virginia’s Mark Warner and New Jersey’s Jim McGreevey — are Democrats who have put workers’ issues high on their agendas. Since 1999, 12 out of the 16 governors’ races have been won by Democrats, and this year there’s “an embarrassment of riches” in the quality of candidates running, said B.J. Thornberry, executive director of the Democratic Governors’ Association.

“We’re very proud of the diversity of candidates,” she said. “There are more women, African-Americans, Hispanics and the first Native American all running in Democratic primaries.”

The Economy and Jobs
The state of the nation’s economy and its impact on working families touched on virtually every issue raised at the conference.

The Tauzin-Dingell bill, for instance, by increasing competition in broadband and expanding high-speed Internet service to rural areas and inner cities, would lower prices for consumers and create thousands of jobs, Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.) said.

“These are jobs with decent wages, decent benefits, decent retirement, decent health care, the kind of jobs you’ve fought for all your lives and all during the life of this great trade union,” Dingell said, thanking CWA for members’ hard work on behalf of the bill. It passed the House by a wide margin in late February and is now in the hands of the Senate, where opponents have pledged to block it.

Fair trade was a hot topic, with “fast track” now in the Senate after squeaking through the House by one vote last year. Fast track, also called trade promotion authority, would give President George W. Bush the green light to negotiate trade pacts with no input from Congress. Trade deals such as the 34-country Free Trade Area of the Americas agreement, which has virtually no language protecting workers or the environment, couldn’t be amended. Lawmakers could only vote yes or no on the full package.

While backers argue that it’s “fair trade,” Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) said there’s nothing fair about it.

“We’re told it’s a ‘new day,’ that the global economy means that jobs can be moved from Terra Haute, Ind., or Fargo, N.D., or Los Angeles or Pittsburgh to Bangladesh and Indonesia, Taiwan and China — places where employers don’t have to worry about the restrictions of a safe workplace or not putting chemicals into the stream or into the air, or paying a decent wage,” Dorgan said.

Dorgan noted a series of trade imbalances brought about by so-called “fair” trade talks. “We negotiate a trade agreement with Canada and we take a $10 billion trade deficit and turn it into a nearly $50 billion trade deficit. We negotiate a trade deal with Mexico and we take a $1.5 billion trade surplus and we turn it into a nearly $30 billion trade deficit,” he said. “Last year, we imported 579,000 cars from Korea and we sent 1,700 American cars there.”

Another economic issue raised was welfare reform to truly lift people out of poverty, rather than increase their burdens. Changes in welfare programs are putting many past recipients and their children out on the street, Baca said, noting that food stamps helped him provide for his wife and child years ago. He told of being raised in a poor, 15-member family and shining shoes, delivering newspapers, working as a janitor and dishwasher to make ends meet, before becoming a teacher and then a manager at GTE.

Pension Security
Not surprisingly, Enron was on the lips of virtually every speaker. The collapse of the energy giant and telecom’s Global Crossing, among other corporate failures, spells the grave need for reform to protect workers’ pensions and hold executives accountable, they said.

Sen. Max Cleland (D-Ga.), who lost both legs and his right arm in a grenade explosion while serving in Vietnam, spoke of the fundamental differences in values between military leaders and corporate leaders.

“In combat, officers eat last,” Cleland said. “In the economic combat of this nation, the Enron officers ate first. That, to me, is unforgivable.”

Bahr said big business lawmakers, who let Enron and other companies write their own rulebooks, must be held accountable, too. “The Enron scandal is not about what the administration did when the company was on its way down, but about the influence of this corporation on government policy when Enron was on its way up,” he said.

The self-serving accounting rules are deliberately complicated, Cohen said, “but our message to Congress is simple: We want to control our own pension plans, no lock-ups while company executives sell their own shares. We want a system where pensions are for retirees, and not for management to plunder.”

Pelosi, the highest-ranking woman ever in Congress, said the greed of Enron management “is almost unimaginable,” but not altogether different from the handouts big business and its political allies are demanding.

“They think the best way to revive the economy is to give hundreds of billions of dollars to the wealthiest people in this country,” Pelosi said. “We have to have an economy that respects its workers, that realizes its success springs from its workers.”

Fighting Back
Ensuring that working families have a strong voice in Congress means organizing, speaking out and reforming an election system that’s broken — from outdated voting machines, typically in low-income areas, to laws that bar eligible voters from casting ballots, speakers said.

“The president promised that election reform would be in his budget last year. I’m still looking for it,” said Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-Texas), urging CWA members to take the lead in a poll-watching effort to make sure voters aren’t intimidated and that those whose eligibility is questioned can cast provisional ballots.

“Just one college campus in Florida had 1,200 students denied the right to vote,” she said. “They had registered, but their names didn’t appear on the list. When they called the elections office, the lines were busy all day. The same thing happened all over the country.”

Fair elections and free speech are both fundamental to American democracy, and speakers urged CWA members not to be silenced by the idea that opposing the White House’s domestic agenda is unpatriotic.

“There’s this notion that being united means we can’t talk about the pain and suffering our brothers and sisters are going through across this country,” said Democratic Party strategist Donna Brazile, who ran the Gore-Lieberman campaign.

“We need to talk about it. We have to speak out,” she said. “It’s time for us to fight for a prescription drug benefit for seniors. It’s time workers in this country got a raise in the minimum wage. It’s time for a patients’ bill of rights so we don’t have HMOs telling people whether they can see a doctor. It’s time.”