The A.F.L.-C.I.O.'s leaders voted yesterday to assess the nation's trade unions $19 million over three years toward labor's political efforts. þþAt a meeting in Manhattan, the federation board overwhelmingly backed the increase, with only the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the International Association of Machinists voting against it.þþJohn J. Sweeney, president of the labor federation, which includes 66 unions, said the money would be used to make sure that corporations did not drown out the voice of workers in Congress and in national elections. þþTeamster officials said they opposed the increase because they thought that the A.F.L.-C.I.O. was not acting bipartisan enough, meaning they that thought it tilted too heavily toward the Democrats.þþThe increased assessment comes to 4 cents a union member per month. As the federation has 13 million members, the action will raise nearly $6.5 million a year for efforts that include voter turnout, lobbying and educating workers. Labor leaders said the money would help finance its $34 million program in the two-year political cycle. þþNoting that corporations outspend unions more than 10 to 1 in elections, Mr. Sweeney said, ÿThe legislative process must not be a one-sided affair.ÿ þþExplaining his vote, the Teamsters' president, James P. Hoffa, said he had pressed the A.F.L.-C.I.O. to endorse more Republicans, adding that unions gain little if the Democrats take them for granted and the Republicans write them off. Mr. Hoffa said unions needed to build a coalition of pro-worker lawmakers from both parties.þþÿWe want a pro-worker majority,ÿ he said. ÿThat's not moving to the Republicans. That's forming a coalition.ÿþþMr. Sweeney said he had tried to make his federation more bipartisan, adding that unions would back more Republican Congressional candidates this year than recently.þþMr. Hoffa voted a day after his union, with 1.4 million members, threw its support behind the re-election of Gov. George E. Pataki of New York, a Republican. Teamster leaders also said this week that they hoped to reduce the percentage of Teamsters' contributions to Democrats, traditionally 93 percent, to 70 percent, with the Republicans' percentage climbing to 30 percent.þþMany labor experts and several labor leaders said the Teamsters were strengthening ties with Republicans in part to persuade the White House to end a 13-year-old consent decree that set up intensive federal supervision of the union to cleanse it of corruption. Insisting that the union has been largely purged, Mr. Hoffa has often said his top goal is to end the federal supervision.þþÿHoffa is trying to position his union to get something in return from the Republicans,ÿ Daniel Kruger, a professor of industrial relations at Michigan State University, said. ÿI have no problem with that. It could be to stop the entry of trucks from Mexico, and it could be to get out of the consent degree.ÿþþMr. Hoffa denied that his union was improving ties with Republicans to have federal supervision ended. ÿWe think we deserve to get out of it on the merits,ÿ he said.þþHe noted that the union had bucked the Republicans in many areas, opposing trade liberalization and backing Democratic gubernatorial candidates in New Jersey and Michigan.þþThe Machinists' president, R. Thomas Buffenbarger, said he opposed the plan because it needed more focus and should do more to hold lawmakers accountable.þ
Source: NY Times
