(The Associated Press circulated the following story on August 21.)
WASHINGTON, D.C. — An AFL-CIO endorsement of Dick Gephardt “is admittedly a long shot” for the Democrat who has staked his presidential hopes on the support of organized labor, his campaign manager said Wednesday.
Gephardt’s campaign appears to be lowering endorsement expectations in advance of a mid-October meeting where union leaders will decide if the Missouri congressman has enough labor support.
“Our strategy is to either win an AFL-CIO endorsement, which is admittedly a long shot, or get the process concluded relatively early so that we can … get our labor support into play in the early states,” said Gephardt campaign manager Steve Murphy.
The bar is high: two-thirds support from the collective memberships of union presidents at the general board meeting. The AFL-CIO has 65 affiliate unions with 13 million members.
Only two candidates have won preprimary endorsements from the federation — Al Gore in the last election and Walter Mondale in 1984.
“Getting to two-thirds, as our detractors point out, is very difficult to do,” Murphy said.
Union support brings a campaign thousands of foot soldiers working on a candidate’s behalf, and money to help back those efforts.
Gephardt, a longtime ally of organized labor, nabbed his 12th union endorsement Wednesday with the Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical and Energy Workers union. The manufacturing union with 300,000 members has lost about 30,000 members in the last two years in the economic downturn, said union President Boyd Young.
“We believe that Congressman Gephardt is the best hope for America’s future,” Young said, highlighting his campaign’s emphasis on the loss of U.S. jobs overseas because of free trade agreements.
Assuming all 65 union presidents vote in an endorsement contest, Gephardt must win support from unions with at least 8.7 million members. So far, his endorsements have a collective membership of 3.5 million.
Those endorsements have come despite a request by AFL-CIO President John Sweeney for unions to wait until the federation decides whether to act.
“There are a number of affiliate unions that have not moved yet that we’re confident will move when this (endorsement) process concludes,” Murphy said. “That’s the ultimate goal for us, to get the maximum amount of international labor union support active on our behalf before Iowa and New Hampshire.”
Gephardt, who ran unsuccessfully in 1988, still must convince some powerful leaders of large service and public sector unions that he is not yesterday’s candidate.
He’s had mixed results. Gephardt failed to meet his national fund-raising goals, and his lead as measured by polls in Iowa, where the first votes will be cast for president in 2004, has eroded.