Labor:

Card check: Democrats can expect fight

Friday, Nov. 7, 2008 | 2 a.m.

WASHINGTON — A national association of concrete company executives gathered two months before Tuesday’s election in an ornate room off the Senate floor to meet with Republican Sen. John Ensign.

‘Card check’ ads bypassing Nevada (10-21-2008)
Nevada political update: Election news in a battleground (10-20-2008)
Election could help fulfill union dream, management nightmare (10-19-2008)

The Nevada lawmaker laid out a grim picture of what would happen if Congress approved and the president signed a labor-backed bill making it easier for unions to organize in the workplace. The legislation had not enjoyed enough support to pass the current Senate, but would surely return in future sessions of Congress.

Ensign, who headed Republican election efforts in the Senate, regarded the Employee Free Choice Act his No. 1 tool in raising money important to candidates in a handful of close races across the country.

The act was becoming part of those campaigns. Unions were spending tens of millions of dollars to promote the legislation, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and others were just as furiously spending money against.

Ensign made no direct appeal for financial help that morning two months ago, but the message was clear. The bill was bad for business and as union membership swelled, the law would be bad for the Republican Party in Washington.

“Unions don’t spend money to elect Republicans,” Ensign told the concrete execs. “They spend money to elect Democrats. From our perspective, this would have devastating consequences.”

Tuesday, six Democratic Senate candidates who support the bill won their elections. (Other key races remained undecided.)

A poll of 942 voters in Senate battleground states taken Nov. 2-4 and released Thursday by American Rights at Work, an advocacy group, showed just three Republican voters said they were voting against the Democratic candidate because of the union issue.

Now, with Democrats enjoying greater numbers in the Senate, unions and their allies see passage of the bill as a top priority. President-elect Barack Obama has said he supports the bill. President Bush does not.

The bill would allow unions to form if a majority of the employees agree by signing their names to a card. Current law says company owners can require an election. Unions say elections can take months to organize, enabling managers to intimidate workers before voting begins.

But businesses argue that doing away with the secret ballot, and simply allowing workers to sign their names to a card, will allow union bosses to twist arms outside the privacy of the voting booth. Ensign calls it “un-American.”

Unions, including those on the Strip, think the bill will enable workers to organize with less interference from company executives. The Las Vegas experience suggests they are correct.

The Mirage was the first Las Vegas casino that struck an agreement with the Culinary Union that represents Strip workers for this kind of organizing, and most other Strip operators have followed suit.

Even with greater numbers of Democrats in the Senate, a few Republicans would still be needed to cross over to pass the bill. Last year only one Republican did so.

“We must pass the Employee Free Choice Act,” Tom Woodruff of Change to Win, a coalition of major unions, said in a statement Thursday. “Corporations and CEOs have used their tremendous power to threaten, coerce, intimidate and fire workers for trying to form a union.”

Steve Smith, a spokesman for the AFL-CIO, said the union is retaining its teams of election workers in such states as Minnesota, where Senate races remains undecided, to push for the bill’s passage.

“We’re obviously going to be mounting a strong campaign,” Smith said.

Chamber President Thomas Donohue foreshadowed the brutal battle ahead.

“We do not want that to become law,” Donohue said Thursday.

The chamber thinks its campaign in the battleground states elevated the issue among voters, and it too has resources to continue the fight. Its own statistics show 7 percent of Americans are aware of the union issue, compared with as many as 30 percent in battleground Senate states where ads were shown.

“We are well prepared,” Donohue warned. “It’s not going to be a walk in the park.”

Discussion: 14 comments so far…

By KDR81

11/7/08 at 7:30 a.m.

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This is one of the most disgusting things Democrats can ever push through. They originally wanted secret ballots because they believed the company would intimidate workers.

But when workers got to vote in secret they choose to unionize less and less. Turns out when given a choice free from coercion people didn't want a union.

Now democrats want to eliminate the peoples freedom to choose their affiliations by allowing intimidation and coercion back into the mix.

Shame on democrats for their work fighting against peoples freedom.
By Future2012

11/7/08 at 8:47 a.m.

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Dems do not need Republican votes and do not want Republican votes. They have the Democratic votes to pay back the Unions in a big way.

Andy Stern (SEIU) is on Obama's Labor Secretary short list.

Just realized that the area in the U.S. that are in severe depression like Michigan, Ohio, Las Vegas, etc. have heavily unionized states and towns, with union elected and run governments. They have price points for goods and service that cannot be supported by consumers.
By jfnance32

11/7/08 at 8:49 a.m.

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This is in direct conflict with "lets govern from the middle-center" hype that has been pushed by the media and Obama camp.

This anti-democracy bill is about left-wing as one can get.

Hopefully, the Republicans will filibuster this one.
By vc

11/7/08 at 10:02 a.m.

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If businesses are treating their employees right to begin with they have nothing to worry about.
By jfnance32

11/7/08 at 10:20 a.m.

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It is not the businesses that I am worried about it is the workers.

I once was part of union election. If the pro-union workers found out that a worker was not pro-union that worker was harassed often even some of their cars damaged.

And that was with secret balloting.

With this law, now imagine a couple of union thugs walking up to you and demanding that you sign a card voting for the union.

It will be the end of democracy in the work place.

Workers will be thugged into voting for unionization whether they like it or not.

This is an extreme liberal push to force unions on to the work place. This goes against all the media hype that Obama wants to govern from the middle-center.
By KDR81

11/7/08 at 11:17 a.m.

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Card Check only unionization is Anti-free choice. Period.
By homer

11/7/08 at 11:25 a.m.

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KDR81, For years now employeers have done the intimidating with the help of right wing courts and a guttless National Labor Relaions board.The coercion as you put it has been from the employeers.The things you take for granted when you go to work, that is if you work are things that unions won for you before you were born. Get your facts straight.

Future2012 You could not be more wrong.Those states with severe depression as you put it are victims of NAFTA,GAT,Bush and deregulation of the banking industry by McCain and Phil Gramm.

jfnance32,I would expect nothing less from a reationary like you with no facts to make a nit wit statement like that. The right to join a union is democracy. I remember some bs about the compassionate conservative that turned out to be a little man who would never tell the truth again. As you make your ridiculous rants the Republicans are in a secret meeting at Buzzels home trying to see if they can keep their party together and how they must change their agenda to stay alive for another election.I think you made up the the story about being part of a union election to get yourself some 'post time' attention. You are just a little 'Rush' who spends way to much time listening to talk radio and Fox News.Obama and the Democrats are in charge and you need to quit sniveling. If Republicans and conservatives had done the right thing America would not have overwhelmingly sent them packing. Don't talk about the middle,Republicans never once cared about the middle.
By homer

11/7/08 at 11:28 a.m.

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KDR81 Are impaired or a fool?The person has a choice when they fill the card out. You really don't know a thing about this issue.
By redferret

11/7/08 at 11:53 a.m.

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Homer,
KDR just thinks that business is full of smart people who really love their employees and want to do right by the consumer. And then the real world hits.
Businesses do whatever they can to get the results and profits. Often they are smart enough to keep it moral and legal, but just as often businesses will be ruthless and do whatever it takes to make a buck. That includes screwing the worker as hard as they can, especially in these economic times. Walmart is the best example. They routinely violate minimum wage laws, work regulations, OSHA regulations, and EPA regulations. Not to mention in the quest for profits and low prices they import from China, land of tainted milk and lead based childrens' toys.
By jfnance32

11/7/08 at 11:57 a.m.

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Homer, you really don't know a thing about how a union fight is all about.

Lets say, I come over to you with 3 really big guys who say "If you do not sign this card then life will be hell for you."

That is not democracy at work.

If you really think open ballot is democracy then you should be consistent and ask for open ballots in general elections, too.
By redferret

11/7/08 at 1:38 p.m.

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Quite frankly there's bullying on both sides, but the path to progress should go down the middle. Intimidation on either side should be stopped, but if workers want to unionize for better pay/benefits, they should.
By read4knowledge

11/8/08 at 4:20 p.m.

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homer
A few facts for you. The 1999 Gramm-Leach-Bliley banking deregulation bill was supported by Rubben and Summers ,voted for by Biden and signed by President Clinton.
By morgen

11/30/08 at 1:27 p.m.

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KDR is a member of NPRI - "Nevada Policy of the Right wing Institute," what do you expect?