Jul 24 2005
Democrat Earth Quake
This is going to rattle any already rattled democrat party. The schism between the liberal fringes and what is left of the depleted moderates is continuing to widen
The AFL-CIO succumbed to division Sunday, with its largest union deciding to bolt the 50-year-old federation and three others poised to do so in a dispute over how to reverse organized labor’s long slide.
The four unions, representing nearly one-third of the AFL-CIO’s 13 million members, announced Sunday they would boycott the federation’s convention that begins Monday. They are part of the Coalition to Win, a group of seven unions vowing to reform the labor movement – outside the AFL-CIO if necessary.
The Service Employees International Union, with 1.8 million members, plans to announce Monday that it is leaving the AFL-CIO, said several labor officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to discuss the developments.
The Teamsters union also was on the verge of disaffiliating, and would likely to be the first to follow SEIU’s lead, the officials said. Two other boycotting unions were likely to leave the federation: United Food and Commercial Workers and UNITE HERE, a group of textile and hotel workers.
Watch for indications the Jewish and African American vote will also be moving away from a no-holds-bar democrat constituency and back to a key players who will decide elections by being truly non-partisan.
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