Richard Mellor
Afscme Local 444, retired
HEO/Ged
8-8-25
Some years back in the early 2000’s my friend and fellow union activist, Roger Martinez and I walked in to our monthly membership meeting. As soon as we got through the door we noticed two guys sitting there who we didn’t recognize.; they certainly didn’t look like any of our blue-collar brothers or sisters. Our conversation went something like this:
“Who do you think those two are Rog?”
“They look like a couple of lawyers to me, Rich”
“Yeah, that’s what I think”, I reply
“They’re either a couple of lawyers or staffers from the International Union.” Says Rog.
Well we were half right. They were staffers from the AFL-CIO, and they were there to get our local, Afscme 444, on board with the AFL-CIO’s latest campaign titled; “The Immigrant Workers Freedom Ride: "On The Road to Citizenship". The term “Freedom Ride” was in deference to the Freedom Train movement of the 1960’s in the US South., but in 2002 buses would be carrying immigrant workers. Other than that, there was no significant similarity with the past.
The idea was to cross the country traveling through working class communities culminating in rallies in Washington DC and New York City. The initiative was started by the Hotel and Restaurant Employees Union (H.E.R.E.), now H.E.R.E./UNITE, in order to, “….counter anti-immigrant bigotry and xenophobia in the wake of 9/11.”, according to UNITE’s website. It should occur to any serious political activist or trade unionist that being able to explain to a worker in Cleveland why their job went to Mexico and what a worker/union response to it should be, including why it’s in our interest to defend immigrant workers, would be first on the agenda. Unfortunately not.
The AFL-CIO’s resolution on the campaign is here. H.E.R.E. represented hotel, restaurant and other workers in the hospitality industry and many of them are immigrants as anyone who has stayed in the big hotels in Las Vegas or other US cities would know. So the union had a vested interest in pushing immigration reform and getting the wider labor movement to support it. This industry has contributed greatly to the percentage of US workers in organized labor. It’s all about revenue which is what members’ dues is.
After the two staffers’ presentation there was some discussion. Both Roger and I opposed supporting this campaign as it was presented to us. We distanced ourselves from one member whose opposition was from the right and a touch xenophobic. We explained that while supporting immigrant rights and countering the bigotry and fear of immigrants taking our jobs is essential, the campaign needed to have a program and set of demands that can appeal to all workers on a class basis rather than moral appeals for fairness and respect for immigrants’ rights.
We pointed out the failings of a bus tour or freedom ride through middle America for immigrant rights where thousands of jobs had been exported to Mexico and other countries where human labor power was cheaper and democratic rights weaker. In many industries, the immigrant population was beginning to replace native born workers as a cheaper option. This was occurring not because immigrants are more “willing” to work for less as the mass media always frames it in order to denigrate the native worker as lazy and spoiled, the immigrant worker, often limited by language as other issues is more desperate.
An example was the meatpacking industry. Twenty years earlier with the defeat of the Hormel Strike,wages and the conditions in the meatpacking industry continued to worsen. Injuries to workers increased as belt speeds were increased and workers looked for better options. In order to maintain the supply of bodies, meatpacking companies in the mid-west, “…recruited illegal workers in Mexican villages and brought them north. Nebraska state officials estimated that illegal migrant workers represented 25% of the meat packing workforce.” Sharing The Pie p 68 by Steve Brouwer.
It was a serious mistake to organize a bus tour through many US working class communities with immigrant rights as the only theme, when these workers had their jobs exported to Mexico or they were replaced at half the wages by Mexican or other workers from our southern border (Canadians are in no rush to work here). Surely, this would do more to strengthen anti-immigrant feelings than build solidarity and class unity between immigrant and native born workers. Any person with an ounce of sense would understand that.
But the purpose of that bus tour in 2002 was not to strengthen or build the organized or unorganized workers’ movement. There is nothing further from the minds of the strategists atop the AFL-CIO. That’s why there were no demands that would appeal to the average worker to get involved in anything. Even those that sympathised with and supported favourable legislation to protect and guarantee immigrant rights would hardly take to the streets for that.
The resolution from the AFL-CIO supporting the campaign in 2002 makes it clear that the goal of the mobilization, “…was meaningful legislative reform in Washington, D.C……” In other words, pressure the Dems to pass a law here and there. That’s it.
I am reminded of these experiences as I came across the AFL-CIO’s latest bus tour campaign launched a month ago at union headquarters just down from the White House, (closer to their friends and safer ground, far from the folks who pay the dues). The new bus tour is titled, “It’s Better in a Union: Fighting for Freedom, Fairness and Security” bus tour. Wow! The strategists atop organized labor have got a gem there. Not sure many workers will take to the streets, miss the PTA meeting, extra overtime work needed to pay the child care for that one even though we know we’re better off in a union than working non-union in most cases.
“It’s ‘Better in a Union’ bus tour is officially bringing union power to a city near you!” says the AFL-CIO in its announcement as the, “…bus tour will crisscross the nation to amplify workers’ voices on our fights to organize….”
Political Activity
Let’s be clear here. The heads of organized labor have no intention of mobilizing the potential power of their members in order to counter the offensive of capital that will continue with Trump.
The Freedom Bus Tour 22 years ago and the bus tour today is simply an attempt by the labor hierarchy to get their Democratic Party friends in to office and return to the status quo of a somewhat less aggressive administration than the present one.
The split that took place in the AFL-CIO back in 2005 that led to the Change to Win Coalition caused much excitement among the liberals but that split was over the same issue, organizing and drawing more members in to organized labor giving it increased clout at the ballot box. In other words, it was all about electing Democrats to office and organized labor has given the Democratic Party billions over the decades and is unequivocally pro market and pro-management.
But this support for the other Wall Street party has undermined labor’s leadership even further and is one of the main factors in the rise of Trump. The disgust with the two parties of capitalism is so deep that the union leadership’s support has to be carefully couched within obscure phrases. This has been ongoing. I was at an Afscme International Convention back in the 1990’s when I first started noticing that open support for the Democrats was not so prevalent and was replaced by the need to elect candidates that support “working families” no matter the party though that’s pretty much always Democrats. The term working class here in the US is avoided like the plague.
At the announcement for the super militant Bus Tour last month leading up to Labor day, AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler, “rallied the crowd around how a union contract gives workers the freedom, fairness and security”. “And the answer is not a political party—the answer is not more of the broken status quo—the answer is a good union job!”, she added.
Why Won’t The AFL-CIO Leadership Form a Party?
The answer to that question is fairly simple. As things stand, the folks that sit atop the AFL-CIO, an organization with 14 million members in it and whose members could, with little effort bring the US economy to a halt, can always blame politics in general or the Democrats in particular when they turn on us. For the labor hierarchy to venture in to the political arena with an independent party of our own based on our organizations and our communities, it’s a tricky situation; such a development would inspire millions of workers as the two parties of capital are so despised but it would also mean they would have to produce the goods and the labor leadership is wedded to the market, capitalism, profits and the right of the boss to make them at our expense. So they dodge the bullet any way they can including forcing concessions on their own members.
This does not mean we should give up on our unions. We should not, as some socialists and leftists argue, abandon these organizations that our ancestors built through great sacrifice and struggle, without a fight. Part of the campaign against the class collaborationist policies of our own leaders is like the wider struggle for reforms in society as a whole. The conclusions workers draw from such a struggle for reforms is that they cannot resolve the crises that we face in capitalist society or the unions. What workers learn in the struggle for reforms is that we have to change society. We have to usher in a new era.
I have been out of the labor movement battles for 20 years or more but I cannot accept that the bureaucracy is so entrenched there is no possibility of movement at all; they are like rotten apples on a tree that seem to be firmly fixed but the slightest breeze dislodges them without effort. We need to provide that wind.
If you are in a local union in particular and are an elected, rank and file leader (not a paid staffer) and you are not engaged in this internal struggle to take control of our organizations then you are not doing your job.
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