CWA, Unions Turn Out Huge Election Victory in Mississippi

 

Travis Childers campaigns at veterans home in Oxford, Miss.

CWAers and union members throughout Mississippi pulled together to bring about a stunning election victory as Democrat Travis Childers won election to the U.S. House of Representatives from the traditionally Republican first congressional district.  CWA locals coordinated efforts with political alliance partner the United Steel Workers.

This was the second such win in less than two weeks. On May 3, voters in Lousiana's sixth congressional district voted in Don Cazayoux, a Democrat, from a district that had sent Republicans to Congress for the past 34 years.

CWA District 3 Legislative-Political Coordinator Beverly Hicks said every CWA local union and unions throughout the state got involved and worked together. "It's so important to put people in office who will be accountable and who will support working families and the issues that are so important to us. That's exactly what happened in this election," she said.

District 3 sent out mailings to every CWA member in the district and deployed "robocalls" with a recorded message from Vice President Noah Savant, urging members to go to the polls for Childers.

Garry Jordan, president of CWA Local 3517 in Tupelo, said the key to the election was making members fully aware of the issues and what Childers stood for, and local members "carried that message to churches, ballgames, civic meetings, and around the dinner table."

"People here know what the issues are and they stayed focused. They weren't swayed by the Republican advertising that was so terrible" or Republican attempts to distract voters from the economy, health care and other concerns for working families, he said.

"We'll do it all over again in November" when Childers must run again, Jordan said, adding that union members were seeing a real change in Mississippi and the opportunity to elect a U.S. Senator and other representatives who would "get people health care, get them workers' rights and the Employee Free Choice Act and stay focused on their issues."   

Members of CWA Local 3511 also played a big part in the campaign, joining in phone banking and making sure everyone knew how important it was to vote. Coordinating activities across unions was Debra Noble of Local 3511.

Brenda Scott, president of Local 3570, the Mississippi Alliance of State Employees, said locals sent information to union members, had team captains in charge of work locations to further talk with members and organized phone banking. "We did everything we could to make sure that Travis Childers had an audience to talk about his message," she said.

Scott noted that the Republicans put out a lot of "negative and untrue advertising," a tactic which backfired. "People in Mississippi are suffering and wanted a candidate who they knew would work hard for them," she said.  "We put all our energy together and had a big impact. And we're not going to let up," she said.