(The following story by Alec MacGillis appeared on the Washington Post website on August 29.)
DENVER — A few months ago, it looked as if this might be the year when organized labor’s spot in the Democratic Party would slip a notch or two.
Sen. Barack Obama had managed to launch his insurgent primary campaign almost entirely without labor backing, with his first few major endorsements not coming until after he won the Iowa caucuses. Some of the country’s biggest unions spent heavily in attacking him on behalf of Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, and others backed former senator John Edwards. Obama had, it seemed, managed to secure the nomination with his own brand of organizing power and a conciliatory message that moved beyond labor’s more pugilistic stance.
But with the presidential race closer than many expected, labor leaders here at the Democratic convention asserted themselves anew this week and cast their unions as saviors for a candidate who they say needs them more than ever. Despite Obama’s initial success without labor backing, labor leaders said no one is better poised to address what has emerged as his biggest challenge: winning over white working-class voters in key Rust Belt states where unions still maintain a considerable presence. Polls show Obama faring about as well with these voters as Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.) in 2004, but to win in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan, Obama probably needs to improve on that.
“There’s a bit of irony in it,” said Gerald W. McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, who has lined up behind Obama after sharply criticizing him during the primaries, when his union backed Clinton. “They are counting on the American labor movement for boots on the ground and mobilization — and it’s nice to be thought of that way.”
Labor’s investment is considerable. The AFL-CIO and its member unions are spending $250 million this election cycle. The alliance aims to knock on the doors of 10 million union households, make 70 million phone calls, drop 20 million leaflets at work sites and send out 25 million pieces of mail. It is primarily focusing on 3 million people in AFL-CIO households that it has identified as swing voters.
The Service Employees International Union, which belongs to the Change to Win alliance, is spending $85 million, some of which will be used for television and radio advertisements, unlike the AFL-CIO, which is focusing exclusively on outreach to its members.
Labor leaders point to recent elections for proof of their impact. Even in a time of declining membership, voters living in union households turn out at higher levels and are far more likely to vote Democratic. In 2004, members of union households made up 37 percent of the vote in Michigan, 30 percent in Pennsylvania and 34 percent in Ohio, well above levels of union membership in those states. Kerry performed about 30 percentage points better in those states among white members of union households than among other white working-class voters.
The union push could have ramifications beyond Election Day. Obama had good relations with organized labor as a state senator in Illinois, and won endorsements in the middle of the primaries from, among others, SEIU, the Teamsters and the influential casino workers’ union in Las Vegas. But he has also spoken about the need for Democrats to break from union orthodoxy at times, as in his advocacy for performance-based pay for teachers. Organized labor’s priorities this year are a reassessment of trade deals and the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, which would make it easier to organize work sites. The act would allow workers to form a union by signing authorization cards and end a company right to demand a secret-ballot election overseen by the National Labor Relations Board before a union could be certified.
Obama has in recent months softened his rhetoric on revisiting trade deals, to the consternation of some union leaders. But he continues to speak out strongly on behalf of passing the Employee Free Choice Act, and union leaders say they fully expect him to push for it if he gets elected.
Because the race appears to be close, labor leaders, like other Democrats here, urged Obama to deliver his economic message more forcefully. “He has a lot of plans, but he has not always articulated them in a passionate enough way,” said Anna Burger, head of the Change to Win coalition. “I’ve seen that message delivered — it’s in his gut. He just needs to be doing it more often.”
But labor leaders are mostly focusing on their own efforts, which they candidly describe as a drive to get their members to focus on their economic needs and not be distracted by whatever reservations they might have about voting for a black candidate who is relatively new on the national scene. Labor leaders said their internal polling showed Obama faring much better with union members than with other working-class voters, and that Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) was an unappealing option for many members — but that many were still unaware of basic facts about Obama, such as his having been raised by a single mother and paying his way through college.
“You have to go out and educate voters,” said Teamsters President James P. Hoffa. “People will vote against their own economic interests out of fear, out of demagoguery, out of racism. Those are the things we’ve got to penetrate . . . to look them in the eye and say, ‘This is your life; this is your pocketbook; this is your home.’ ”
The AFL-CIO’s education effort has included a mailing that addressed false rumors about Obama, a video about him to show to members, and carefully calibrated instructions to locals on how to broach the issue. “What the McCain campaign has deteriorated to is . . . scaring away voters. It has created an atmosphere where there is fear and hesitance about Senator Obama,” said AFL-CIO political director Karen Ackerman. “This election is about [whether] voters are comfortable voting for Obama.”
One rank-and-file union member here had absorbed the message, even though his union, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, is the only AFL-CIO unit yet to endorse Obama. John Keisler, 57, who works at a Denver area company, said he will vote for Obama after years of voting Republican, because the economy trumps all else.
“You hear the same old stuff from the McCain campaign,” Keisler said. Obama “understands what needs to be done. He’s aware of what we’re going through.”