(Change to Win issued the following news release on November 1.)
WASHINGTON — With less than a week before Election Day, Change to Win (CtW) Chair Anna Burger will join CtW affiliate members in several key states who are pounding the pavement in greater numbers than any previous midterm to build the political power needed to strengthen workers’ voices — at all levels of government.
Activist members from the CtW unions have committed significant resources to continue to work with the entire labor movement and other progressive partners on Congressional races in all 50 states, but they have also focused a comprehensive, strategic program around gubernatorial and down-ballot statehouse races in the battleground states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Ohio, where CtW represents 830,000 members. In those three states alone, thousands of volunteers in CtW’s member-to-member program helped coordinate 4.8 million phone calls, 3.2 million pieces of mail and hundreds of thousands of worksite fliers.
There are more initiatives on the ballot than in any year since 1996, which has the potential of changing the direction on key economic and worker issues like minimum wage. Teamsters General President James P. Hoffa will join Burger in Michigan for a multi-city GOTV barnstorm on Monday, Nov. 6 to defeat an anti- affirmative action initiative and support candidates who have stood up for good jobs and a paycheck that supports a family.
“Politicians make decisions that affect our jobs, our families, our lives,” said Burger. “That’s why members from the most politically active unions — the Change to Win unions — are volunteering in a massive, grassroots effort at their worksites and in their communities to help elect candidates who will fight to make work pay for ordinary Americans, not just corporate America.”
Burger will also make stops at phone banks, canvasses and GOTV rallies in Wisconsin, Iowa and Missouri. Go to http://www.changetowin.org and click on “Anna Burger’s Campaign Notebook” and then “Click here to see her schedule” for a detailed schedule.
The highest-ranking woman in the labor movement has additionally been sharing stories about the workers she’s encountering in her Campaign Notebook blog at http://www.changetowin.org. “I’m hearing from workers in both red states and blue who are united in their hopes and their concern for their children and their country,” she said. “And on Nov. 7 they will be sending a strong message that they want common-sense solutions on issues like health care.”
Burger has also blogged about how workers are building political power to unite in their industries and once again have a real voice on the job, and reminding voters Election Day is only the beginning to a push a real agenda for change.
About Change to Win
Change to Win was founded in September 2005 by seven unions and 6 million workers to build a movement of working people with the power to make work pay for everyone. It believes that all workers should have a paycheck that can support a family, affordable health care, a secure retirement and dignity on the job. The seven affiliated unions are: Service Employees International Union, UNITE HERE, United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Laborers’ International Union of North America, United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America and United Farm Workers of America.