AFL-CIO PLACES UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE
AT CENTER OF 2008 ELECTION DRIVE

The AFL-CIO will make achievement of affordable, universal health care the centerpiece of its 2008 election drive, elevating the issue to the top of the national domestic agenda, AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney announced on August 29.

Sweeney chose his annual review of the state of unions--and of working men and women around the nation--to lambaste the incumbent GOP Bush regime, and politicians in general, for failing to tackle key problems, such as declining health insurance coverage and the lack of the right to organize.

But he spent more time talking about the future than about the past, saying the AFL-CIO, with other union allies--including Change to Win and possibly the National Education Association--would concentrate on an intensive, many-layered educational campaign on health care between now and November 2008, and stretching beyond that, to holding politicians accountable for fixing the mess in 2009.

Health care will take precedence over other worker causes, including the Employee Free Choice Act and the right to organize, Sweeney added. But those will not be ignored. Instead, they along with health care will be part of labor’s giant educational campaign on how to create an economy that works for working families.

The importance of the health care issue was highlighted by Census Bureau data issued the day before, which showed a record 47 million people are uninsured and that, for the first time, the percentage of large corporations that offer health insurance to their workers has slid below 60 percent. Millions more are underinsured and health insurance at smaller firms is spotty or non-existent.

And even at the larger firms, workers are being forced to pay higher premiums and co-pays, coverage is being cut, health care costs are the #1 issue in bargaining and retiree coverage is being eliminated, Sweeney said.

“Health care is the top domestic issue for our members and all Americans, and the AFL-CIO is making the 2008 elections a mandate on fixing our broken system. We will hold candidates at every level responsible for supporting comprehensive, progressive national health care reform and we will elect a president and a Congress prepared to turn their campaign promises into reality,” he declared.

“It is truly at the top of the list and that’s what we’re focusing on,” Sweeney said.

“But I do not want to minimize the other issues that are crucial, particularly the Employee Free Choice Act and trade,” he hastened to add.

Though “we’ll put more of our resources than ever before” into the massive educational and political campaign on health care, the federation will not take a stand now for a particular piece of legislation or for or against a particular Democratic candidate’s health care program, Sweeney said.

Sweeney did not give a dollar figure for political spending on its non-partisan education and get-out-the-vote drives. It spent $45 million in the last election cycle.

In response to a question, Sweeney said a single-payer government-run health care bill, HR 676 by veteran pro-labor Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.), which would abolish the insurance companies and their role, is a possibility, along with others.

The federation has previously backed Medicare-for-all legislation--which would expand the federal health care program to everyone but leave some role for private insurers--sponsored by Senate Labor Committee Chairman Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), House Commerce Committee Chairman John Dingell (D-Mich.) and House Health Subcommittee Chairman Pete Stark (D-Calif.).

Sweeney also pointed out that unions will keep pushing states to act on health care, citing California, which has one-eighth of the U.S. population. California AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Art Pulaski, who spoke via speakerphone, said state legislators there are in intense negotiations over a plan that would mandate all employers cover workers or pay into a state fund that does so.

Pulaski said the California version of single-payer is stalled and that GOP Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who unveiled ideas earlier this year with much fanfare, never formally submitted anything to the Democratic-run legislature.

On other issues, Sweeney, joined by two health care workers at the podium and by AFSCME President Gerald McEntee, chair of the federation’s political committee, by speakerphone, said:

• The federation would “build an army of 1 million actiists” on health care, drawing them from state feds, local unions, internationals, Central Labor Councils and Working America, the AFL-CIO affiliate for people who cannot join unions.
  
  The federation and the National Labor College will train activists in the issue, who in turn will be expected to train their colleagues, especially to meet attacks on health care reform from the drug industry, the insurance companies and--though he did not say it--the GOP, all using the “big lie” tactics of the infamous “Harry and Louise” TV ads of the last health care fight, in 1992.
  
  
• The first step will be to defend the State Children’s Health Insurance Program and its expansion against a Bush veto plan. “No child should go without a polio shot or a pre-school (health) exam because George Bush threatens to veto funding for a children’s health program.” Sweeney said. The Democratic-run Congress wants to expand the SCHIP program, which now covers 6-million-plus poor kids, to cover another 9 million.
  
  
• Announced the AFL-CIO would host a worldwide organizing conference, at the National Labor College, in December.
  
  
• Though the federation has no immediate plans for a presidential primary endorsement, it is still encouraging its member unions to go through an intensive member-oriented process in evaluating candidates before making their own decisions. “Conditions could change” Sweeney admitted, saying that is unlikely.

That presidential hopeful will, if the AFL-CIO has its way, not be a Republican. GOP responses on health care range from leaving people to the mercies of the private system--advocated by former Massachusetts Gov.Mitt Romney--to “leave it to the states,” pushed by former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, AFL-CIO staffers said.

That presidential hopeful will, if the AFL-CIO has its way, not be a Republican. GOP responses on health care range from leaving people to the mercies of the private system--advocated by former Massachusetts Gov.Mitt Romney--to “leave it to the states,” pushed by former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, AFL-CIO staffers said.

“We expect to have the most ambitious (political) campaign we’ve ever had. We expect to have record numbers” of union participants and turnout, Sweeney said. He noted that in 2006, 74% of unionists voted for union-endorsed candidates and that unionists and their families were one-fourth of the entire electorate--double the percentage of union workers in the U.S. population.