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Biden: ‘We Can’t Achieve a Middle Class Without a Strong Labor Movement’
Unions and their members will be a “gigantic part of the solution” to rebuilding the middle class, Vice President Joe Biden told the 3,000 delegates to the AFL-CIO Building and Construction Trades Department’s (BCTD) legislative conference.
Biden, speaking via videotape yesterday, told representatives of the 13 BCTD unions:
Welcome back to the table, it’s about time after eight years….We now have people on the Hill, we now have people in the White House who care a lot about you and respect you….For too many years we had a leadership in this country that dealt the middle class out of the American dream. We’re going to change that. We’re going to deal the middle class back in and you’re a big, big reason why….We can’t achieve a strong middle class without a strong labor movement. In this administration we know you are not the problem. You are a gigantic part of the solution.
Before delegates wrapped up the morning session and headed to Capitol Hill for an afternoon of lobbying on key issues such as the Employee Free Choice Act and health care reform, they heard from progressive radio and TV talk show host Ed Schultz.
Schultz said it’s time to hold accountable the lawmakers who rode union family support to office and tell them they must make good on their promises to move a working families’ agenda, especially the Employee Free Choice Act.
When you go to the Hill, tell them: “I’m here, I’m in Washington, I’m going to knock on your door and I’m going to tell you the union folks of this country, collectively every union together, raised more money and did more social networking, and did more phone calling, and put more boots on the ground than at anytime in contemporary American history, I will tell you directly, it’s time to collect!”
I know if the Employee Free Choice Act is passed it is the only hope we have of rebuilding and reconstituting the middle class in this country as we know it.
Schultz plans to feature the conference and the work of the BCTD on an upcoming edition of The Ed Schultz Show on MSNBC.
AFL-CIO President John Sweeney told conference attendees their work to win support for the Employee Choice Act will play a major role in winning other key issues to help rebuild the middle class.
We will never turn around our economy and make it work for working families until we reform health care, rein in our corporations and restore the freedom to organize…the Senate votes we need to end the filibuster against the Employee Free Choice Act are the same votes we’ll need to pass universal health care, re-regulate the banks and the big corporations and eventually restore the economy.
When Sweeney finished his remarks, BCTD President Mark Ayers joined him on the podium. Noting that it was the last time Sweeney would address the conference as AFL-CIO president—he is retiring after this year’s AFL-CIO convention in September—Ayers honored Sweeney for his dedication in leading the union movement.
Our “Hats Off” award is the building trades’ highest honor, an award for exemplary leadership made to those who make a real difference in lives of the members we represent. John Sweeney has done that and more.
Click here for BCTD’s daily video updates from the conference.
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3 Comments
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We used to have a strong middle class until the unfair trade agreements and the love of China began…Now that it almost too late everyone is worried…..
Every employer who feels threatened by the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act will be doing their utmost to water down or eliminate this important pro-worker legislation. Not only do these greedy employers not want any new union workers, they would love to see the demise of all existing unions. That is the ultimate goal of anti-worker employers—to eliminate all the things that unions have fought for and won over the years. Daily overtime, meal breaks, paid sick days, medical benefits, paid holidays, paid vacations, pensions and a host of other things beneficial to workers are constantly under attack.
American workers deserve to be able to join or form a union free from the fear of employer harassment or retaliation. Current labor laws do not adequately protect workers’ rights. We need the Employee Free Choice Act to preserve what working Americans have fought for for centuries. Don’t let the employers continue to erode our rights on the job! We need to be heard loud and clear on this point—it is our right.
Look at it from corporate America’s viewpoint: it would lower the company’s bottom line to pay out more in employee benefits and cut back on CEO and upper level bonuses and high salaries…..don’t you just feel so sad for the greedy hogs? (sick humor)
It would force them to be compassionate and humane to their employees by giving them benefits that European workers already have.
Now we have to emphatically remind those people we elected because of their promises on the EFCA to keep those promises…they have very short memories when it comes to those of us who were not mega-million dollar donors to their campaigns…