The movement to take out the CAFTA 15 picked up more momentum in New York City on a humid Sunday morning. The targets: Reps. Gregory Meeks and Edolphus Towns. At yesterday’s press conference on the steps of City Hall, Gregory Meeks and Edolphus Towns were pilloried, and it’s clear they won’t see a dime of labor money for their coming re-election campaigns or have any union troops working on their behalf.

Whether they find themselves facing a primary opponent is still to be determined: Not everyone is ready to publicly call for their defeat but there was a lot of informal conversation at the event among labor people about recruiting and strongly supporting primary challenges to these two so-called Democrats.

From the standpoint of action, several participants released a letter (see below) to House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi demanding that the two so-called Democrats be removed from their committee assignments where, in the words of the letter, “They have used their committee membership cards to access corporate America’s ATM at the expense of working families for far too long.”

Wilfredo Larancuent, a vice president of UNITE HERE and a member of the Working Families Party executive committee, announced that unions would also begin an informational campaign to about 75,000 union members in each of the two districts to inform them how the two had voted.

The event was organized by the Working Families Party, but it’s worth mentioning how broad the group was, in the wake of the disaffiliations from the AFL-CIO: New York City Central Labor Council AFL-CIO, International Association of Machinists, International Brotherhood of Teamsters Joint Council 16, IATSE l600, RWDSU/UFCW, United Federation of Teachers, DC 37, United Auto Workers, Communications Workers of America, UNITE HERE!, Mason Tenders District Council, DC9 International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 3,Professional Staff Congress, UFCW Local 1500, SEIU Local 1199.

From my point of view, Brian McLaughlin (left, in red shirt) gets the statesman award for starting his remarks by underscoring that, in terms of any effect the recent disaffiliations of SEIU, UFCW and the Teamsters might have on coordinated labor work, “Today is a shining example of [the split not having much effect] in New York City when it comes to those generic issues, solidarity campaigns, mobilizations, working partnerships with our allies…” And he specifically acknowledged the unions representing the Change To Win coalition.

So, the sentiment against Meeks and Towns cut across “party” lines. Let’s hope that can continue throughout the country.

Some excerpts from the rally’s speakers:

Dwight Loines, the regional political director for the United Auto Workers (seen here to the immediate right of speaker Wilfredo Larancuent): “Now, Meeks told us…that I’m not with you on the merits but if it comes down to a vote and my vote is crucial I’m going to be with you. Guess what? His vote was crucial and he was not with us and that is frankly not acceptable…We’re going to make it clear that their careers are going to be affected by this. Meeks and Towns are on the wrong side of this issue, history is moving against them and for some reason they chose this time to double cross the labor movement and their constituents.”

Jim Conigliaro, head of District 15 of the Machinists: “They sold us out to big corporations they sold out their constituents, they sold out us Democrats…We’ve given them money over the years. I will commit—he (Meeks) will not get another dime from the machinists union every again. We’re not usually a one issue union…this issue was too big, we can’t forget…Meeks and Towns, they gotta go.”

And more from McLaughlin: this vote is not a yes vote for CAFTA, it is a no vote for good paying American jobs…CAFTA will mean another 51,000 jobs lost in New York State…These were two Democratic votes from two congressional leaders who have had a long-standing relationship with organized labor…and to say we’re disappointed is an understatement. We can simply not stand here today and accept two congressional leaders who have taken our support, who we’ve handed out leaflets for…(to which one person in the crowd yelled, “make ‘em pay!”)

=========================================

August 7, 2005

BY FAX
The Hon. Nancy Pelosi
Minority Leader
U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515

Dear Leader Pelosi:

The undersigned represent hundreds of thousands of members of labor and community organizations in New York.

We are appalled that two of our state’s congressional Representatives – Gregory Meeks and Edolphus Towns — voted to send American jobs overseas by supporting the Central American Free Trade Agreement.

Reps. Meeks and Towns had an opportunity to act on behalf of workers here in the United States and across Central America by stopping CAFTA. Instead they voted on the side of multinational corporations that want to sell off U.S. jobs to the lowest bidder while doing nothing to improve the lives of workers anywhere.

Moreover, Reps. Meeks and Towns have established a pattern of favoring corporate interests over working families. In addition to sending jobs overseas, Towns has supported shifting the tax burden from the most affluent to working-class New Yorkers via elimination of the federal estate tax , and Meeks has sided with credit card companies over consumers by supporting the bankruptcy reform bill.

We urge you to remove Reps. Meeks and Towns from their seats on the Financial Services and Energy & Commerce committees, respectively. They have used their committee membership cards to access corporate America’s ATM at the expense of working families for far too long. It is time for Meeks and Towns to turn in their cash cards.”

Sincerely,

Bob Master
WFP State Co-Chair
CWA Region 1

Bertha Lewis
WFP State Co-Chair
NY ACORN

Jim Duncan
WFP State Co-Chair
United Auto Workers (Retired)
Wilfredo Larancuent
WFP Executive Committee
UNITE HERE
Michael McGuire
WFP Executive Committee
Mason Tenders District
Council

Karen Scharff
WFP Executive Committee
Citizen Action of NY

Sam Williams
WFP Executive Committee
UAW Region 9