(Des Moines Register published the following story by Lynn Okamoto on its website on August 10.)
DES MOINES, Iowa — U.S. Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri choked up Saturday when accepting the endorsement of the Teamsters – a union his father, a truck driver, belonged to before he died 15 years ago.
“How proud my dad would be to see me here today getting the endorsement of his union that fought for him,” Gephardt, wiping his eyes, said at a Teamsters rally in Des Moines.
Gephardt is one of nine candidates vying for the 2004 Democratic nomination for president. Saturday’s endorsement from the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, which has 10,000 members in Iowa, was his 11th union endorsement.
Labor will be key to winning Iowa’s first-in-the-nation precinct caucuses Jan. 19. About 70,000 workers belong to Iowa’s six largest unions, and union activists make up about a third of Democratic caucus activists.
In 1988, Gephardt won the Iowa caucuses, but went on to lose the Democratic nomination to Michael Dukakis.
This year, Gephardt’s momentum among union leaders is causing him to be attacked from both the left and the right on labor issues.
U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio, another Democratic presidential candidate, last week criticized Gephardt for not being willing to go as far as canceling the North American Free Trade Agreement, which eliminated trade barriers among the United States, Canada and Mexico.
Meanwhile, U.S. Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut assailed Gephardt for being against NAFTA and voting against it in 1993.
Gephardt, in his speech to several dozen Teamsters members, vigorously defended his vote against the agreement. He said it encourages cheap labor, and lacks labor and environmental standards. He said he saw the effects when he traveled to Mexico and China.
“The plants are as good as anything in the United States, but the workers live in the cardboard boxes that bring the products out of Mexico,” Gephardt said.
Gephardt’s vote against NAFTA in 1993 went against President Clinton, a fellow Democrat. Lieberman said NAFTA is part of the reason the economy was successful during the Clinton administration. Gephardt disagreed.
“I was the guy who took on my own president, who I like and trust and tried to work with every day,” he said. “He was wrong on NAFTA.”
He pointed to Maytag Corp.’s decision to close an Illinois factory and move jobs to Mexico as an example of why current trade policies don’t work.
“I’m the one who’s led the fight for 20 years to get not just free trade in America, but fair trade in America,” Gephardt said.
Teamsters General President James Hoffa announced the endorsement of Gephardt at a rally Saturday in Detroit. The group then flew to Iowa and New Hampshire for similar rallies.