March, 06 2012, 11:05am EDT
GOP Presidential Candidates Pose Super Threat to Working People
Mary Kay Henry, president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), issued the following statement today in reference to Super Tuesday primaries:
"While the country watches to see who will emerge the winner tonight, the only thing "super" about the moment is the "super" threat that each of the GOP presidential candidates pose to the American people.
WASHINGTON
Mary Kay Henry, president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), issued the following statement today in reference to Super Tuesday primaries:
"While the country watches to see who will emerge the winner tonight, the only thing "super" about the moment is the "super" threat that each of the GOP presidential candidates pose to the American people.
"There should be no illusions and no intrigue about any of Republican presidential candidates' misguided agendas for working people. Each GOP primary candidate has made it clear they want to double down on policies that do nothing to help working families or the more than 23 million Americans looking for work. Instead, they advocate for policies to protect loopholes and tax breaks for millionaires and large corporations; policies that give free reign to the Wall Street banks that wrecked our economy; and anti-immigrant policies that promote discord and strife.
Our country simply can't afford that approach. If there's one thing that's clear this election: Working people need and want elected officials to fight for:
- Good jobs NOW;
- Making the rich and large corporations pay their fair share in taxes;
- Quality public services; and
- Creating a pathway for citizenship for every immigrant worker.
While the stakes may be high for each candidate tonight, the stakes are even higher for the American people. It's time for candidates to put the needs of the 99 percent above extreme political ideology and offer real plans that provide real relief."
With 2 million members in Canada, the United States and Puerto Rico, SEIU is the fastest-growing union in the Americas. Focused on uniting workers in healthcare, public services and property services, SEIU members are winning better wages, healthcare and more secure jobs for our communities, while uniting their strength with their counterparts around the world to help ensure that workers--not just corporations and CEOs--benefit from today's global economy.
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Progressive International (PI) asks and answers this and other questions with an extensive new database published Wednesday that connects the dots in what the leftist group calls the "Reactionary International"—a loose global network of right-wing leaders and organizations working to subvert democratic institutions.
PI calls it an "illicit network undermining democracy around the world."
"Today is a mask-off moment for the Reactionary International and the parties, politicians, judges, journalists, foundations, think tanks, tech platforms, NGOs, activists, financiers, and entrepreneurs that comprise it," PI said.
"After a year of preparation, we finally open the doors to our new research consortium, exposing the global network of reactionary forces that corrode our democracies, destroy our planet, and drive us closer to world war," the group added.
"The twin insurrections at the U.S. Capitol in 2021 and Brasília's Three Powers Plaza in 2023 left no doubt about the international coordination of reactionary forces," PI argued. "Yet far too little is known about the entities of this network, their sources of financing, and their institutional allies operating inside our political systems."
Ultimately, PI aims to "support democratic systems to become more resilient to their insidious tactics."
From leaders like Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and former U.S. President Donald Trump—the presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee—to evangelical Christian groups influencing laws in African countries criminalizing LGBTQ+ people and tech companies empowering ubiquitous state surveillance, Reactionary International is a who's-who of the world's right-wing forces.
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Andre Segura, vice president of litigation at the environmental legal group Earthjustice, said Wednesday that the Republican attorneys general aim to "eviscerate civil rights protections just to make it easier for industrial polluters to continue with business as usual."
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Manuel Fernandez, president of Miami-Dade County Democrats in Florida, said the effort was "embarrassing" and called on Moody to resign.
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As Volkswagen workers in Tennessee began voting on whether to join the United Auto Workers, progressive critics on Wednesday continued to call out six Southern GOP governors for jointly saying they "are highly concerned about the unionization campaign driven by misinformation and scare tactics that the UAW has brought into our states."
Govs. Kay Ivey of Alabama, Brian Kemp of Georgia, Tate Reeves of Mississippi, Henry McMaster of South Carolina, Bill Lee of Tennessee, and Greg Abbott of Texas issued their statement in response to "the largest organizing drive in modern American history," which the UAW launched after major contract wins following a strike targeting the Big Three automakers—General Motors, Ford, and Stellantis—last year.
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What actually threatens American workers?\n\u274c Anti-union, anti-worker propaganda like this\n\ud83d\udcb0 Corps that put profits over people\n\u26d1\ufe0f Safety standards not being met\n\n@GovAbbott & @GovernorKayIvey sound more like corporate lobbyists than governors here. @UAW backs American workers!— (@)
The Economic Policy Institutesaid Wednesday that the governors' anti-union statement "clearly shows how scared they are that workers organizing with UAW to improve jobs and wages will upend the highly unequal, failed anti-worker economic development model of Southern states."
Responding to the statement on social media, the Congressional Labor Caucus declared that "we speak up when we see threats to workers' rights. Workers must be allowed to choose whether to form a union on their own—free from influence from their employers or politicians. Shame on these governors for putting out this anti-union propaganda."
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MSNBC's Chris Hayes was even snarkier, jokingly calling the statement "yet more evidence of the populist, pro-worker turn of the Trump-era GOP."
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Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, also took aim at Ivey, saying, "You used Alabama taxpayers' money to have state troopers escort out-of-state scabs to break the strike of YOUR constituents."
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More Perfect Union told Ivey that "unions only threaten your values if you value denying workers a living wage and good benefits."
In contrast with the Republican governors, around two-thirds of the Senate Democratic Caucus in January wrote to 13 nonunion automakers—including Mercedes and Volkswagen—urging them not to illegally block UAW organizing at their plants.
"We are concerned by reporting at numerous automakers that management has acted illegally to block unionization efforts," the senators stressed, citing multiple examples. "These retaliatory actions are hostile to workers' rights and must not be repeated if further organizing efforts are made by these companies' workers. We therefore urge you all to commit to implementation of a neutrality agreement at your manufacturing plants."
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