Published 05 Apr, 2011
As legislative attacks against labor continue to mount, a new urgency has emerged for labor to fight back to defend basic human rights and stop the anti-worker agenda growing in more than 20 states.
During this pivotal political moment, the 2011 TWU Committee on Political Education (COPE) Conference opened Tuesday, April 5 to educate and mobilize TWU members in the fight for workers rights. TWU Director of Legislative and Political Affairs, Portia Reddick White, stressed the importance of uniting and mobilizing to stop the anti-worker legislation being proposed in states across the country and at the federal level.
In his opening address, TWU International Vice President Harry Lombardo welcomed members, retirees and officers to Washington, D.C., but did not mince words, “We are at a crossroads here, the lines are drawn – the TWU is all in,” he said.
Referring to recent state bills attacking public sector employees in Wisconsin, Ohio, and Indiana, Lombardo, whose wife is a teacher, exclaimed, “It sickens me to see others trashing teachers and other public servants across the country.”
Nick Unger, from AFL-CIO’s Strategic Campaign Center, said that working people are losing big time with the anti labor attacks but called on unions to stand up. He compared labor’s current situation to the battle of Gettysburg, the determining battle of the Civil War. “We are at our Gettysburg opportunity now. You are the last line of defense, or the country goes to hell in a hand basket…what you do, will keep America a democracy,” said Unger.
Building power and creating change depends on building community alliances and mobilizing all people impacted by the corporate agenda, said Erica Smiley from Jobs with Justice.
Barbara Easterling, representing over four million members with the Alliance for Retired Americans, spoke about the financial attacks aimed at the elderly, many on fixed incomes, and echoed the sentiment in the room that, “the time for division is over, we are one.”
Officials from the Obama Administration discussed important transportation issues impacting TWU, including Deputy Secretary of Transportation (DOT) John Porcari, Federal Railroad Administration Deputy Administrator Karen Rae, Federal Aviation Administration Administrator Randy Babbitt and Federal Transit Administration Administrator Peter Rogoff. They commended TWU leaders for their involvement on committees working with the DOT.
Congresswomen Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) and Yvette Clarke (D-NY11) addressed the attendees telling them to stay in contact with your congressional representatives in order to build your case and tell your story. “Labor has a distinct history, it is not taught in schools, most people take what they have for granted these days, we need to hear about labor and their struggles,” Congresswoman Clarke said. “When you’re disconnected from your history, anything can happen to you. Tell your story!”