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Painters, Steelworkers, Machinists, Sheet Metal Workers in Election Flurry |
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The Machinists (IAM), Painters and Allied Trades (IUPAT), Sheet Metal Workers (SMWIA) and United Steelworkers (USW) are helping make history for Sen. Barack Obama and working families.
The USW has set a new record this election season, marking its largest political mobilization in history: More than 10,000 USW members have volunteered to take part in phone banks, walks and other events. In a special video message, USW President Leo Gerard congratulates the thousands of union members who have turned out and says we need to keep up the efforts for the final days. The stakes are too high, Gerard says, to let the election slip away and let countless hours of hard work go to waste.
Now is not the time to let up. Now, with our hard work in the coming days, we can win health care, we can win the kind of future we want for our kids and grandkids. We can win the Employee Free Choice Act and we can win the rebuilding of America’s industrial base. We can win the kind of future that we all dream of, that brings us some equity and justice.
They often say that campaigns are won or lost in the four days before the votes are cast. We can’t let up. We have to work harder than we’ve ever worked in these last days.
This Saturday, Gerard and thousands of USW members will hold a massive rally in Pittsburgh to energize volunteers for the final get-out-the-vote drive.
IAM members are focusing this week on getting the vote out in Kentucky, Ohio and Pennsylvania. IAM President R. Thomas Buffenbarger has hit the trail to support Obama and pro-worker candidates in these states as the election approaches. At a rally in Erie, Pa., yesterday, Buffenbarger encouraged members to step up their volunteer efforts in the final days before the election.
Brothers and sisters, you want to be able to tell your children and your grandchildren that on Nov. 4, 2008, the day we changed the country for the better, the day we changed the world for the better: “I was there. I made that happen.”
We all need to ask ourselves today if we are doing everything we can to make sure that happens. Are you talking to your brothers and sisters on labor walks? Are you leafleting at your workplace and participating in member phone banks? We can turn America around and make it a better place for working families.
Many SMWIA members are receiving a special message in the mail this month in the form of a DVD spelling out the differences between Obama and Sen. John McCain on health care, trade, Social Security and other key issues.
In the latest issue of the SMIWA Journal (PDF), General President Michael Sullivan says that when it comes to the economy, jobs and issues that affect workers and their families, there’s just no comparison. He encourages members to look at the issues and cast their vote in favor of workers, their rights and an economy that works for everyone.
In the years ahead, Sheet Metal Workers will need every vote and every ounce of political support we can muster—to defend our jobs, our rights at the workplace, and our family’s well-being.
Barack Obama…has a strong, solid Democratic record of fighting and voting on the side of working families. John McCain, on the other hand, has supported the anti-worker policies of the Republicans over 90 percent of the time.
IUPAT members continue visiting key states to rally members and get out the vote. On Tuesday, vice presidential candidate Sen. Joe Biden met up with the IUPAT bus tour in Florida. Tomorrow, IUPAT will hold a rally in Tampa. IUPAT President James Williams has been traveling around the Midwest, visiting Minnesota and Ohio over the past week, with more stops planned in Michigan and Ohio over the coming days. Williams will wrap up his tour in Pennsylvania on Monday. At every stop, the IUPAT Florida bus tour and Williams’ Midwest tour are getting union volunteers fired up and involved in rallies, pone banks, worksite visits and door-to-door walks.
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Paid for by the AFL-CIO Committee on Political Education Political Contributions Committee, www.aflcio.org, and not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee.
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