CHICAGO — The labor vote has taken center stage at the Democratic National Convention as Vice President Kamala Harris looks to fend off Republicans’ attempts to court union members.
Retired union members and the heads of some of the nation’s largest labor unions have praised Harris from the convention stage, contrasting with Teamsters President Sean O’Brien’s historic speech at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee last month.
O’Brien didn’t endorse former President Donald Trump, but his remarks — the first ever by a union president at the RNC — were a clear acknowledgment of shifting labor politics.
While at the RNC, former Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker told TMJ4 News that he thinks working-class voters who typically back Democrats are flocking to Trump, just like they did to Ronald Reagan in the '80s.
Watch: Is the union vote shifting in American politics?
“Those people voted for Reagan because he had a strong conservative message that resonated — and they were called Reagan Democrats,” Walker said. “Those people today are overwhelmingly Trump supporters because he stands up for the hard-working men and women of this country, whether they’re in a union or not."
During his time in office, Walker signed Act 10, a law that effectively ended collective bargaining for most public sector unions in Wisconsin.
Trump’s populist economic messaging has swayed some rank-and-file union members, but Stephanie Bloomingdale, president of the Wisconsin AFL-CIO and a Democratic delegate, said she believes Harris’ pro-labor record puts the vice president in a good place with Wisconsin workers.
“Because of what she and President Biden did with the infrastructure law and the support for working people, that means that we understand that it’s going to be better for union workers and all workers if we have Kamala Harris as our president,” Bloomingdale said.
In battleground Wisconsin, where the 2020 presidential race was decided by less than 21,000 votes, the labor vote is one of several voting blocs that could ultimately decide the winner in 2024.
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