Skip to footer

AFL-CIO chief's message to Obama: 'jobs, jobs, and more jobs'

The head of the largest trade union federation says President Obama will have to hammer home a message of 'jobs, jobs, and more jobs' to keep the support of white working-class men this election.  

|
Michael Bonfigli/The Christian Science Monitor/File
In this photo taken last year, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka is shown at a Monitor-hosted breakfast for reporters in Washington.
  • By Linda Feldmann Staff writer

| Washington

Richard Trumka, president of the AFL-CIO, the nation's largest trade-union federation, says President Obama should hammer home the message "jobs, jobs, and more jobs" in order to win over white working-class men, a group that he got strong support from in 2008. He also says the US Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling, which removed restrictions on corporate and union spending in political campaigns, has been "corrosive" on the US political system, but unions will use it to their benefit. Mr. Trumka was the guest at a Monitor breakfast on Aug. 9.

How President Obama can win over white working-class men:

"Keep talking about jobs, jobs, and more jobs.... This is the union difference in the last election: Obama lost white men in the last election by 16 points. But he won white union men by 18 points.... He lost white women by 7 percent, but he won white union women by 47 percent."

AFL-CIO's budget for the 2012 election:

"We'll have ample resources this time around.... If you want a figure, I'm not going to give it to you, because that will be the story.... We'll have over 400,000 activists trying to get votes, knocking on doors...."

Impact of Citizens United ruling, which allows unlimited independent expenditures by corporations and unions:

"We opposed Citizens United; we think it's corrosive to the system. But since it's there, we'll use it.

The Keystone XL pipeline, which Mr. Obama rejected despite labor support:

"A lot of people try to say it's either-or: Either you do the project or you destroy the environment. I think there's a way to do things both ways."

The role of race in the election:

"I'd be foolish to say it's still not an issue, because it is. But it's less [so] this time, because we've had four years. The sky didn't fall. Everybody didn't grow tails and a pitchfork."

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to AFL-CIO chief's message to Obama: 'jobs, jobs, and more jobs'
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/monitor_breakfast/2012/0814/AFL-CIO-chief-s-message-to-Obama-jobs-jobs-and-more-jobs
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe