Speech

Trumka to BCTGM: "I'm ready to fight!"

Las Vegas, Nev.

Thank you!

And thank you, David [Durkee], for that truly warm and generous introduction. I’ll do my best to live up to it. And thank you for including me in your convention. It’s an honor to be with the BCTGM, and I’m glad to be with you here in Las Vegas.

Now, let me ask you something. where’s Frank [Hurt]?

Brothers and sisters, you know as well as I do how little Frank Hurt likes fanfare, but he’s not president anymore, so I’m gonna say what I’m gonna say.

Frank Hurt is a very special guy, and the amount of respect I have for him is tremendous. He has always been a solid trade unionist, to his core. He never forgot where he comes from -- he comes from a mining family in West Virginia. My father was a miner, and so was Frank’s. My father, bless his memory, died of black lung from breathing all that coal dust. Frank’s father, may God rest his soul, didn’t make it that far. He died from injuries on the job, when Frank was just a young kid.

As you all know, Frank and I worked together for years. We have always had an excellent and supportive relationship, but more than that, we’re friends. We like each other.

Frank, I want everybody to hear me say this: You’re my brother. Thank you for all you are and all you do. For you, I feel an ocean of admiration and love. Your legacy will endure, and we are all, each and every one of us, better off because of it. Thank you.

My friends, please join me in a round of applause for Frank Hurt!

Brother David, you’ve got some big shoes to fill, but you’ve done a great job so far. And let me promise you this, whatever BCTGM needs, anything at all, all you’ve got to do is say the word; the hard-working men and women of the AFL-CIO stand ready to deliver.

Listen, it’s been a rough couple years, for workers, for our unions, and for all of us.

And yet, the tide is changing. All over this country, people are talking about economic inequality, people who never spoke the words before. The public is debating big issues, like a living wage and collective bargaining. We’re talking about rights on the job.

We’ve been wanting this conversation for a long time, and guess what? We’re winning. People like the idea of raising wages.

That’s how we’ll keep turning the tide, you see, we’re all about raising wages. That’s how we’ll build a movement big enough to lift up America’s working families.

That’s how we’ll build a movement powerful enough raise local, regional and national standards. We’ll start by winning good contracts at all the former Hostess plants in places like Billings and Indianapolis, and so many other cities and towns. We’ll start by building powerful community partnerships like the one that’s growing fast in Memphis, Tennessee, and I want to congratulate you on that coalition in particular. That’s the future of American labor. That’s how we will win against all the money and power of Wall Street and corporate greed, because nothing beats people power!

Nobody is going to tear us down. We’re going to lift America up. We’re going to lift America up with union contracts! We’re going to lift America up by raising wages!

Brothers and sisters, we’re going to help working families use unionism to build a better life. I’m not saying that because I like the sound of the words. I’m saying it because it’s true. Unionism works. BCTGM builds strong careers, strong families, strong communities and a strong future for the United States of America.

The best way to fair pay, is a union contract.

The best way to retirement security, is a union contract.

The best way to a better tomorrow, so you can give your family a decent life and health care and a good education, it all comes back to a union contract.

And a decent life is not too much to ask, because we’re the workers of America. We mill the grain and bake the bread. We work in factories and on the highways. We lift the loads and answer the call. We do what it takes, no matter what the cost. We wake our country up every single day, and we tuck her into bed at night. We won’t be turned aside. We won’t be faced down, and we will not be denied.

Sisters and brothers, we’re all too familiar with the story of the past 40 years. We know how productivity rose while wages froze, which meant virtually all of the wealth created by our constantly growing economy has gone to the richest 1%.

Our economy doesn’t work when work doesn’t pay.

Household expenditures make up 70% of the American economy. That’s how raising wages will create jobs, because when we do well, America does well. We buy goods and services to improve our lives. We create demand, and corporations hire more workers to meet that demand. It’s what you call a virtuous cycle. It’s the opposite of a race to the bottom. It’s the foundation of a strong economy built on raising wages, not credit card debt and asset bubbles.

At the AFL-CIO we’ve got a new program called Common Sense Economics to teach 1 million regular working people how raising wages works. That’s just one way we’ll turn things around by building power for working people, with information. We’ve got other initiatives, too. We’re strengthening our state federations of labor and CLCs. We’re joining together with allies, in ways we never have before. We’re a mainstream movement, and we’re acting like it.

All across this country, short-sighted executives are following the same model. They’re trying to tear down working people. Here’s what they say, “Do more with less. Work more. Bake more. Clean more. Stock more. Haul more.” And here’s what they offer in return: Less money. Worse benefits. No retirement security. And about that work schedule, you gotta be flexible. We don’t, but you do.

We’ve seen lockouts like never before, all through America’s breadbasket, from California to North Dakota, Iowa to Oregon, and from Minnesota down to Tennessee.

We’ve seen quality companies snapped up by private equity with one goal, to squeeze every available penny and then dump what’s left into bankruptcy for a fire sale. They’re happy to do it. And guess who loses? Workers and retirees. And families and communities. And America.

What do you think of that? I think it stinks.

Here’s what I think: I’m ready to fight!

I’m ready to make a difference, and I’ll tell you something: the American people have begun to understand the connection between good jobs and a strong economy. Good jobs at the bakery, good jobs at the mill, good jobs at the plant, all those good jobs support local businesses. Our neighbors and friends understand that basic idea, and we’re spreading the word.

America is tired of losing middle-class jobs. We’re done with the downward spiral. In poll after poll after poll, we hear Americans say, “We want an economy that works for everyone, not just the wealthy few.”

The AFL-CIO does our own polling. Recently we asked a group of voters if they agreed with this simple statement: “We need to make sure that all of us, not just the CEOs get our fair share in our economy.”

When we asked those making less than $50,000 a year, and two out of three voters agreed. Sixty-six percent said, yes, that’s right, we need to make sure all of us, not just CEOs get our fair share.

Here’s the kicker. Guess who we asked? Registered Republicans. That poll was of voters registered with the Republican Party.

Here’s what this means to me. It means a solid majority of working people of every stripe share the same basic challenges, and the same hopes and dreams, and we recognize economics are at the heart of our problems.

Last year, I met some Panera workers, who came to DC. We were in the middle of the fight to have a full National Labor Relations Board, and let me tell you, you were terrific in that fight, but you know what? Those workers and I never talked political parties. It didn’t come up. I never thought about it, to be honest, because those workers deserve to have their rights respected on the job. Democrat. Republican. What-have-you.

That’s one of the beautiful things that connects us in the labor movement. We all work. We all need work to pay. We are united by the circumstances of our lives, and by the vision and the hopes we share.

We’re not done standing with the Panera workers. And we’re not done standing with any of the workers who are rising up, coast to coast, union and non-union, fast food workers, tobacco workers, taxi workers, domestic workers.

It’s happening. It’s growing. This isn’t something we cooked up in Washington, D.C. It didn’t come from Wall Street. It’s growing in Memphis. It is rising with the postal unions’ boycott of Staples. It rose on Long Island where rail workers said, we don’t want to strike, but we will if you won’t come to the table.

It is rising up from the hotels and casinos right here in Las Vegas.

And it is up to you and me, to each of us, to help make the voices of America, our America, heard in the workplace and in our national life.

Work should never hold us down and trap us in poverty. Work must lift us up. We want our country to work for the people who work!

Power and hope are rising.

We’re on the right path, brothers and sisters. A groundswell is growing, and it keeps getting bigger. It's strong, and it'll get stronger. It's a movement to raise wages, so all of us can live a better life.

We’ll stand together, to raise wages for all. We’ll fight for farm workers and day laborers, bakers and security guards, drivers and teachers! We’ll march together! For working families! For good pay. We’ll stand together! For a strong future. For each other! We won’t back down, or back up, or shut up, until we win a new day for the American Dream. We’ll shout here in Vegas and all across America. And we’ll show how much good raising wages can do.

Sisters and brothers, we have big things to do as a country—put our people back to work, restore our democracy and build 21st century infrastructure. We’re going to strengthen and grow American jobs, not throw them away.

We know what America needs. We’ve got proposals to fix what’s broken, like raising the minimum wage, like bankruptcy reform to protect workers and retirees instead of Wall Street bankers. These are popular mainstream ideas. More than 70% of America’s voters support raising the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour. Sixty-five percent of the U.S. public say the gap between the richest and the rest of us has gotten worse over the past decade, and the same percentage says our growing inequality is bad for America.

We’re putting forward majority ideas when we propose ways to hold corporations accountable, especially the ones that are deserting our country to avoid paying taxes but still expect full American corporate benefits. It’s gotten so bad that even Fortune Magazine—which is about as pro-business as you can get—calls these tax-dodgers—and I quote—“un-American.”

We can fix that, with the right leaders.

And we can make a difference for millions of retail and service workers by turning the new bill from Reps. Rosa DeLauro and George Miller, called Schedules that Work, into law.

And we’re going to fight to raise the minimum wage. You know, it’s been so long since the minimum wage last went up. Sarah Palin was still governor of Alaska, that’s true. And the last time the minimum wage went up for tipped workers, was back in 1991, when Bill and Hillary Clinton still lived in Little Rock, Arkansas! We’re going to fight to raise the minimum wage, because work should lift us out of poverty, not trap us in it.

But that’s not all we want. We want labor law reform.

I promise you, labor leaders have learned some hard lessons, really hard political lessons, over the past five years. Yet I want you to listen very closely to what I have to say, we’re stronger because of the lessons we’ve learned. We’re more independent because of the lessons we’ve learned. We’re more focused, more disciplined, more creative and more powerful because of the lessons we’ve learned.

We’re putting those lessons to use. This electoral season, I want you to work like never before. Be the leaders who lead by example. Be the first to knock on doors. Make the first call at the phone banks. You’ll motivate your volunteers. You’ll strengthen your activists. You’ll help us all connect with more working-class voters, get more working families to the polls, because if we want the policies we need, if we want all of us to get our fair share, we need the right leaders in every corner of America. We’ve got to engage and turn out our people.

When I say, “our people,” I mean union members and families but also like-minded folks in our communities.

But don’t get me wrong. We are not working for any candidate. We are not building power for any political party. Not the Democratic Party. Not the Republican Party. We’re building power for working people, pure and simple. We’re looking at the long view. And we’re not afraid of holding anybody’s feet to the fire. Working families need results. Period.

Yet I promise, I swear, nobody will work harder, or smarter, or longer, to elect the leaders who make the right commitments, and nobody will work harder, or longer, to defeat those who don’t, regardless of political party. And I tell you, we’ve got a long memory, and we will not hold our nose and endorse Democrats, just because they have a D next to their name. That’s not good enough. It won’t happen.

We’re asking hard questions of every candidate who wants our support, and one question we want every candidate to answer is, do you support America’s workers? Do you support our right to bargain collectively for a better life? Do you believe in American manufacturing? Will you grow our economy, not shrink it? Will you raise wages?

Standing together, working people will change this country.

Listen, I know how hard you work. I know how dedicated you are. I know your political activism, and I know your community activism. Keep it up. Keep growing. Keep reaching out.

We’re changing lives. We’re scrambling and reaching for a little more hope. We have a vision. And we’re going to make it real, because when all of us pitch in, that’s shared responsibility, shared sacrifice. We do what it takes.

What we want is simple. It’s what everybody wants, the chance to work hard for a decent life, and to give a better life to our kids. We’ll stand together, because we’re strong together.

We’ll work for it, sisters and brothers. We’ll stand for it. Together. Each of us. With solidarity. Real solidarity. Where your picket line is my picket line. And my picket line is your picket line. Shoulder to shoulder. Arm-in-arm. All day. Every day. As long as it takes. To win together. To raise wages. To grow together. To bring out the best in ourselves, to bring out the best in each other. To bring out the best in America. For the America we can have, and must have, and will have. Keep fighting. Keep winning.

Thank you. Thank you, and God bless you!