Delegates back Sweeney for president, look to build labor movement

Despite the move by at least three major unions to disaffiliate, the AFL-CIO completed its 2005 convention in Chicago with a renewed focus on building a stronger labor movement. Just before the convention, the Teamsters and Service Employees International Union announced they were leaving the federation; the United Food and Commercial Workers followed shortly after the convention.

The AFT, which supported AFL-CIO president John Sweeney for re-election, had a large delegation that included AFT vice president and AFT Healthcare program and policy chair Candice Owley.

AFT president Edward J. McElroy, who nominated Sweeney for president, said in a letter to AFT leaders after the convention that the split is not about “big ideas or the need for change” but rather about “money, power and raids.” He expressed disappointment that the departing unions have “pulled the rug out from under their affiliates” that want to participate in state federations and central labor councils. The AFT supports the AFL-CIO policy of barring unaffiliated unions from membership in such state and local labor bodies.

Despite the distractions of the internal strife, the convention did result in a series of substantive proposals—some of them from the AFT—including an extensive union leadership training and development program for women and minorities, more resources for organizing, industry coordinating committees, and grassroots membership mobilization for politics and legislation.

McElroy said that while the disaffiliations weaken the labor movement, they will not stop the AFT from moving forward “to build the strongest labor movement we can or from reaching out to those unions that have left to see if we can help them find their way back in.”

The AFT also gained a third spot on the AFL-CIO executive council when Laura Rico was elected to that body. Rico, president of the ABC Federation of Teachers in California, joins McElroy and secretary-treasurer Nat LaCour on the council.