Labor Outlines Plans To Retake Congress For Working People

Organized labor has outlined plans to spend $40 million on competitive candidates and an additional $3.5 million on PACs to help candidates favorable to working people issues retake Congress. In a press conference on August 30, John Sweeney. President Of The AFL-CIO and Karen Ackerman, Political Director Of The AFL-CIO fielded reporters questions after a presentation on the importance of offering help to candidates in competitive races who support labor issues.

Karen Ackerman presented information that 70% of labor households who were repeatedly approached with information favorable to 2004 Democratic Presidential Candidate, John Kerry, voted for Kerry, compared to just 30% who voted for Bush. This proved the value of getting out the labor vote.

According to Ackerman and some polling research from the Peter Hart Research Associates, vote totals for prolabor candidates can be greatly improved with targeted "get out the vote" efforts. In Ohio for example, as many as 300,000 more votes from union households are possible. In Pennsylvania, where incumbent Republican Senator Rick Santorum is in great polling trouble, as many as 150,000 more votes from union households can be cast in the November election with this targeted "get out the vote"effort.