Working Families Win in U.S. House Elections
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| Northeast New York Central Labor Council President Betty Lennon, New York State AFL-CIO President Denis Hughes and union members get out the vote for Bill Owens. |
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| New York State AFL-CIO President Denis Hughes and Rep.-elect Bill Owens |
Last night, on opposite ends of the country, union members helped send two new fighters for working families to Washington. Bill Owens won in a closely contested battle in New York’s 23rd Congressional District, while John Garamendi won a strong victory in California’s 10th District.
Both U.S. House seats were open after ex-Reps. John McHugh (R-N.Y.) and Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif.) left Congress to take positions in the Obama administration.
The New York State AFL-CIO and affiliated unions united behind Owens’ candidacy as he faced off against Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman.
Hoffman, heavily funded by corporate-friendly, right-wing groups like the Club for Growth and the anti-health care “astroturf” group FreedomWorks, drove a pro-worker moderate Republican out of the race, using health care reform and the Employee Free Choice Act as scare tactics.
Upstate New York voters rejected these attacks and chose a candidate who supports workers and focused his campaign on job creation and the needs of the 23rd District. Owens is the first Democrat elected to represent this northernmost region of New York in more than a century.
AFL-CIO Thanks Sweeney for His Service as President
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During the 2009 AFL-CIO Convention, President John Sweeney will be stepping down after more than five decades in the union movement and 14 years heading the AFL-CIO. Today, the AFL-CIO Convention unanimously approved a resolution honoring Sweeney and pledging to carry on his values and his hard work.
Union leaders and activists from across the movement stood in support of the resolution, praising Sweeney as a leader and as a person.
As president of the AFL-CIO, Sweeney has fought to strengthen local union organizations and get them involved in their communities, and he also has strengthened the global union movement and increased the role of America’s unions in fighting for workers around the world. Through the creation of Working America, Sweeney helped mobilize and educated 3 million workers without a union. Through the founding of the Alliance for Retired Americans, he gave a voice to 4 million retirees and kept them actively engaged. It’s a record to be proud of and a legacy that will keep the union movement strong in the future.
The Time Is Now for Health Care Reform, Safe Workplaces
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The nation’s health care system is broken and now is the time to act to gain real health care reform. With a vote on health care reform coming soon to Congress, delegates to the AFL-CIO Convention today passed two strong resolutions to provide quality affordable health care and another to ensure safe and healthy workplaces.
They also took immediate action on the floor to mobilize against the insurance industry that is profiting by denying health care to patients who need it and raising premiums.
Both AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka and Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) told the convention the Senate will vote on a health care bill in the next few weeks. After passing the resolutions, delegates signed pledges to work for real health care reform when they get back home. Many used their cell phones to call their locals to march on the major health insurers between Sept. 22 and Oct. 2. AFT President Randi Weingarten, who was presiding over the debate, called the chief lobbyist for the United Federation of Teachers in New York City, her home local, while on the podium, and with the entire convention listening, convinced him to hold an action.
The mobilization is part of an AFL-CIO campaign to hold insurers accountable, Trumka said,
for denying care and shutting people out and using our members’ premium dollars.
Hughes Named Chairman of New York Federal Reserve
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Denis Hughes, president of the New York State AFL-CIO, was named chairman of the powerful Federal Reserve Bank of New York today. Hughes, who has served as acting chairman of the board of directors since May, was named chairman for the remainder of 2009.
Hughes says his experience on the board has been a “great experience,” which has allowed him to see firsthand how the nation’s economy really works.
Says Hughes:
“My job is to do whatever I can to make sure working families are considered when decisions are made.”
Hughes, a 40-year member of the Electrical Workers (IBEW, has led the New York State federation since 1999.
After Eight Years of Bush, Can OSHA be Fixed?
The Bush administration left a lot of wreckage in its wake. The crumbling economy, the home foreclosure crisis and a broken health care system are getting most of the recent headlines and calls for immediate repair.
But for the men and women who get up and go to work every day—and want to come home alive and without injury—there is something else the Bush administration trashed that needs fixing and fixing fast—the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).
