LEGISLATIVE ALERT!

GCIU Vice Pres. Lawrence Martinez is seeking GCIU delegates to the AFL-CIO Industrial Union Council's Joint Legislative Conference. As a member of the IUC, the GCIU is entitled to send delegates to the IUC's Legislative Conference in Washington, DC, on Feb. 3-4, 2003. The federation needs to know how many delegates are attending as soon as possible to plan hotel accommodations and transportation. "Since the GCIU is not holding its own legislative conference next year, it's extremely important for local leaders and members to keep up to date and active on AFL-CIO political activities," Martinez said. "We can make a difference if we work together on a working families' agenda," he said. GCIU activists who want to attend the IUC Legislative Conference should contact Martinez as quickly as possible. Phone 202-462-1400; fax 202-721-0600; or e-mail lmartinez@gciu.org.

The Nov. 5 elections were a sore disappointment for working families, but solidarity and renewed activism can save them from becoming a disaster, said GCIU Vice Pres. Lawrence Martinez, who directs International legislative activities.

Voters returned control of the Senate to Republicans by at least two votes. At Graphic Communicator press time, the new Senate in the 108th Congress will have 51 Republicans, 47 Democrats and one independent.

The Senate seat in Louisiana, where a candidate is required to get a majority of the vote, will be decided in a Dec. 7 runoff election. Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu (D) took 46 percent of the vote to Republican Suzanne Haik Terrell's 27 percent on Nov. 5.

Republicans slightly expanded their majority in the House by five seats so far. The new House will have at least 228 Republicans, 203 Democrats, and one independent. Majority control requires 218 votes.

Three House races are as yet undeclared. Louisiana's fifth district race will be decided in the Dec. 7 runoff. Ballots for Colorado's new 7th congressional district were still being counted at Graphic Communicator press time. A special election will be held Jan. 4 in Hawaii's 2nd district to determine a successor for the late Democratic Rep. Patsy Mink.

Democrats picked up at least two governorships – for a total of 24 to the Republicans' 25. At press time, the governor's race in Alabama was still undeclared with both candidates claiming victory.

The Center for Voting and Democracy noted that voter turnout rose slightly but was still "abysmally low in most states, falling below 40 percent of all voting age Americans." The AFL-CIO said that the failure of the Voter News Service's exit poll tracking system prevented a count on what percentage of voters were in union households. But AFL-CIO Pres. John J. Sweeney said the federation's Hart Research poll showed "record highs" for union voter turnout, and the overwhelming majority of union voters cited the economy as the driving force behind their voting choices.

According to news reports, President Bush and the GOP leadership in Congress consider the election results to provide them with a "mandate" to privatize Social Security by handing retirement accounts over to Wall Street and to push for other legislative changes on the corporate agenda.

However, Martinez said, the election numbers hardly add up to a mandate. "The only mandate they have is from their corporate sponsors. This election was all about money, money, money."

The AFL-CIO said Federal Election Commission reports found that big business outspent working family advocates by a 12 to 1 margin in hard and soft dollar contributions during this election cycle. As of Sept. 9, corporate spending totaled $710 million compared with $62 million for working family advocates. Pharmaceutical companies alone – that stand to profit from the GOP's prescription drug bill – contributed some $18 million to candidates and parties and spent more than $16 million on television issue ads.

"It's not too late to gear up to fight the battles of the future." –GCIU Vice Pres. Martinez

Sweeney said: "This is a very dangerous time. If [Congress and the White House] try to drive a corporate agenda, we'll fight them every step of the way. If they stand with working families, we'll support them."

GCIU Pres. George Tedeschi said "big business is in a feeding frenzy the likes of which hasn't been seen since the first term of Ronald Reagan. We can expect to see a big push for even more tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations with an even greater shift of the tax burden to working families. We can expect assaults on working families and the unions that speak up for them such as the destruction of the public Social Security program; no relief for seniors for escalating prescription drug costs; no relief for high unemployment; elimination of the right to strike; weakening of wage and hour and workplace safety protections; and the stacking of the National Labor Relations Board and the federal court system with anti-worker lawyers and judges."

Martinez said all of these issues will demand very strong activism from working families. He urged GCIU families to get involved by keeping informed on the issues as they come up in Congress and contacting their members of Congress to let them know where they stand. "Visit, write, call, fax, and e-mail your legislators. Work with your state and local labor federations whenever you can. There is much we can do," he said.

Since the "friends of working families let the friends of corporations dictate the debate for this election, we need to focus on our agenda at every turn," he said. "It's not too late to gear up to fight the battles of the future."

The battles have already begun. The lame duck House on Nov. 13 passed a homeland security bill on a 299 to 121 vote that bows to Bush's demand to strip collective bargaining and civil service rights for some 170,000 workers in the proposed new Department of Homeland Security. Sweeney called the bill "a shameful and unprecedented assault on workers" that is an affront to unions' support for the war against terrorism when "firefighters, emergency personnel, and construction workers who put all else aside during the tragic events of Sept. 11 showed the world that being a union member is no obstacle to doing one's job or performing feats of bravery and patriotism."

However, Democrats and some Republicans in the Senate were balking at the bill at Graphic Communicator press time because they said the 35-page bill had become a 484-page bill loaded with provisions benefitting special corporate interests.

Republicans in the House refused a bi-partisan proposal passed by the Senate that would extend unemployment benefits for laid-off workers. Noting that workers paid into the $24 billion unemployment insurance trust fund that is not being used, Sweeney said: "Cutting off jobless workers when there are resources to help them and when the economic crisis is deepening is an unpardonable and cynical act."