BAL HARBOUR, Fla., March 10 — The A.F.L.-C.I.O., long one of the biggest players in presidential politics, announced its most ambitious, most expensive campaign effort on Wednesday, a $44 million program aimed at unseating President Bush.þþThe labor federation plans to urge its 13 million members to vote for Senator John Kerry, the expected Democratic presidential nominee, and will make a special effort to focus on union members who are swing voters. Also for the first time, organized labor will seek to persuade and mobilize hundreds of thousands of nonunion members to vote for labor's preferred presidential candidate.þþÿAmerica's unions are united for the biggest and earliest mobilization effort for the 2004 elections in the union movement's history,ÿ said John J. Sweeney, the federation's president.þþAfter the nation's unions clashed over which candidate to endorse in the Democratic primaries, labor leaders attending the A.F.L.-C.I.O.'s winter meeting here said on Wednesday that there was unusually strong unity behind Mr. Kerry. In speech after speech, union leaders said Mr. Kerry was a friend of working Americans, while Mr. Bush favored the rich.þþÿOur members are excited and unified as never before, and they're ready to mobilize and make a difference in this election,ÿ said Karen Ackerman, the federation's political director.þþIn a 15-minute address, Mr. Kerry spoke to the labor leaders by satellite from a factory in Chicago. He said Mr. Bush had presided over three years of job losses and had done nothing to stop American jobs from going overseas. He accused Mr. Bush of crony capitalism and called for cutting taxes for the middle class and reversing tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans.þþÿRain or shine, surplus or deficit, George Bush's economic prescription begins and ends with tax giveaways for those with special pull and special influence,ÿ Mr. Kerry said. þþAt a news conference at an oceanfront hotel, Mr. Sweeney announced that labor leaders had approved a 4-cent-a-month assessment on the federation's members, which would increase its political war chest to $44 million, an amount Mr. Sweeney said would be dwarfed by corporate political spending. The federation will mostly spend the money on political education for union members and getting out the vote.þþIn the 2000 presidential campaign, the A.F.L.-C.I.O. spent $41 million on politics in seeking to elect Al Gore. Sixty-three percent of union members backed Mr. Gore and 32 percent Mr. Bush. That year, 26 percent of all voters came from union households.þþUnion leaders said they hoped an even higher percentage of voters would come from union households this year. For the first time, they said, unions will seek to persuade not just union members to vote for their presidential candidate, but everyone in the members' household, including spouses, parents and voting-age children.þþUnions also plan to make a special effort regarding the 25 percent of union members they view as swing voters. Labor strategists said they would identify these workers through voter-registration records and other means. Once the swing voters are identified, other union members will telephone them and talk with them at work about issues like Mr. Bush's effort to eliminate overtime pay for many workers.þþIn another new effort, the A.F.L.-C.I.O. will seek to mobilize up to one million Americans who do not belong to unions. Traditionally, union political efforts are limited by law to just unionized workers and members of their households. But the labor federation has started a new group, Working America, that is signing up nonunion workers as associate members who will join unions in matters like raising the minimum wage and political campaigns. þþKaren Nussbaum, the executive director of Working America, predicted that the group, which has 100,000 members, would expand by the end of the year to one million.þþMany labor leaders say the stakes are huge because they fear that if Mr. Bush is re-elected, he will move more aggressively to weaken unions. þþÿThis is the most important election indeed in our lifetime,ÿ said Gerald McEntee, chairman of the A.F.L.-C.I.O.'s political committee and president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. þþ
Source: NY Times
