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Chavez-Thompson to Retire as Executive Vice President |
AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Linda Chavez-Thompson will step down to return home to San Antonio and be with her family, effective Sept. 21, President John Sweeney announced.
Chavez-Thompson is the first person to hold the office of executive vice president and the first person of color to hold one of the top elected offices at the AFL-CIO. She was elected in 1995 after serving in a series of leadership roles in AFSCME and on the AFL-CIO Executive Council.
Chavez-Thompson, who joined the union movement 40 years ago, is a second-generation American and the daughter of cotton sharecroppers. She says she hopes she has been able to raise the voice of those who often are unheard or left behind.
During the recent AFL-CIO diversity dialogues, Chavez-Thompson explained her goals for the union movement:
The wonderful dream of the AFL-CIO will come true only when every member of our movement—black or brown or white, female or male, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or straight, immigrant or native-born, with disabilities or without—is heard, every member has a chance, every member has a voice, every member can rise to the leadership, every member is treated equally.
She quickly became the face of America’s new union movement to millions through her extensive traveling and speaking to union and community groups. Chavez-Thompson has worked to strengthen state and local labor movements and has served as a strong voice on behalf of civil, human and women’s rights. She also has been a national leader on the issue of immigration and immigrant workers’ rights.
AFL-CIO President John Sweeney says of Chavez-Thompson:
In everything she’s done over a lifetime of service, Linda has broken new pathways for the labor movement. Countless working women and men, not only in the United States but throughout the Western Hemisphere, have a better life because of all she’s contributed. She’s inspired tens of thousands of people to contribute through their own action, and wherever she’s gone, she’s earned tremendous affection.
In a letter to Sweeney, Chavez-Thompson said:
I am blessed to have had 12 years worth of wonderful experiences, meeting thousands of union members and workers who have given me hope that our labor movement continues to be a major factor in their lives. You … have given me the opportunity of a lifetime, which was to go where I never dreamed I could go, and do more than I ever dreamed I could do.
Though most of her time will be spent with her children and grandchildren, Chavez-Thompson will remain active in the cause of social and economic justice. Under the AFL-CIO Constitution, she will become the AFL-CIO’s first executive vice president emerita.
She also will continue to chair the AFL-CIO Immigration Committee and serve as head of the Inter-American Regional Organization of Workers (ORIT), the International Trade Union Confederation’s (ITUC) regional organization for the Americas. She also will serve as an adviser to state federations and labor councils.
Sweeney said he has asked the AFL-CIO Executive Council to support his recommendation of Arlene Holt Baker, who currently serves as assistant to the president, to fill the remainder of Chavez-Thompson’s term.
Holt Baker, who has more than 30 years of experience in the labor movement, came to the federation in 1995 as the executive assistant to Chavez-Thompson. At the AFL-CIO, Holt Baker led the efforts to mobilize a labor movement response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005. In 2004, she was executive director of Voices for Working Families, a 527 organization that mobilized working people around core economic issues.
The Executive Council will vote on Holt Baker’s nomination Sept. 21.
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We appreciate voices of all Americans of any heritage. It is those who promote illegal immigration that destroy our schools systems and health care that we do not appreciate. America was built on honor and respect for America. Illegal aliens destroy what has taken so long to build. They do not make America more competitive they destroy the core which made America. Removing all illegal aliens would help put America back on technology rode and save our standard of living. Now as in Mexico we are moving towards eliminating the middle class.