This commentary is by David Van Deusen, who’s running for reelection as president of the Vermont chapter of the AFL-CIO.
As we near the 2021 Vermont AFL-CIO annual convention (Sept. 18 and 19 at Jay Peak, Northeast Kingdom), I again ask our 11,000-plus union members to support the full United! slate in our internal elections, including Ron Schneiderman (UFCW) for vice president at-large, Danielle Bombardier (IBEW) for secretary-treasurer, Dwight Brown (AFSCME) for executive vice president, and myself, David Van Deusen (AFSCME), for re-election to the office of president of our State Labor Council.
Since United! took power in 2019 (and again swept elections in 2020), we have transformed the Vermont AFL-CIO into the most progressive state labor council in the United States. Through United! we have also seen the Vermont labor movement invigorated, with our rank-and-file taking an active part in conventions and political summits at levels not seen in decades.
Over the last two years:
- We have presided over a State Labor Council that has increased membership among affiliates (thereby bucking the national trend of decline), and have signed solidarity charters with two Carpenter locals and one SEIU Local.
- We have worked with social movements and allied organizations such as Migrant Justice, Black Perspective, and 350Vermont in order to move in the direction of a popular front whereby our collective power can be amplified.
- We have fought for a union-led Green New Deal.
- We have supported the Vermont expansion of social benefits and livable wages for all workers (minimum wage increases to $12.55 an hour on Jan. 1, 2022), and supported passage of pro-union bills in Montpelier, such as card check (in committee) and worker classification enforcement (passed), and we have advocated for a Vermont where we practice a more direct democracy through our town meetings.
- We have been vocal supporters of the federal PRO Act.
- We have built more rank-and-file democracy within the State Labor Council (more than doubling convention delegates per local affiliates and greatly expanding the size of the elected executive board).
- We have supported the formation of progressive caucuses within non-AFL-CIO unions such as the VSEA (Vermont State Workers United!) and VT-NEA (School Workers Action Committee).
- We have built up our cash reserves from nearly zero when we took office to tens of thousands of dollars of cash-on-hand.
- We have helped advance passage of building trades-supported responsible contractor ordinances in Montpelier (passed) and Burlington (in committee), and successfully struggled for prevailing wage requirements on the CityPlace project.
- We fought for the interests of the working class during the darkest hours of the Covid-19 pandemic, supporting the state moratorium on evictions (passed), expansion of unemployment insurance eligibility (passed), and hazard pay for thousands of essential workers (passed).
- We have taken union resources out of lobbying and put them toward organizing (hiring on-call organizers).
- We have walked back previous blind support of a Democratic Party that does not adequately support us.
- We have helped elect pro-union (democratic socialist) Progressive Party candidates to the Burlington City Council and General Assembly.
- We have reached out to progressive AFL-CIO affiliates across the U.S. in order to start a discussion aimed at the formation of a nationwide progressive caucus within the national AFL-CIO tasked with transforming the labor movement and supporting the work of progressive leaders such as Sara Nelson (CWA).
- We have taken principled domestic and international stances such as stating our unequivocal support for the Black Lives Matter movement, our support for the struggle of Kurdish-led YPG/YPJ in Rojava (Syria), against the continuing occupation of Palestine, and against the U.S. embargo on Cuba.
- And together we prepared to defend our democracy in the event of a neo-fascist coup in 2020-21 by having our rank-and-file vote to authorize the elected executive board to call for a general strike if there was not a transfer of power in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 20, 2021 (as the U.S. Constitution required).
We have done all this forcefully, with no apologies, and where needed we were unafraid of standing up to those giants within the status quo who fear a more assertive, more militant, and more rank-and-file-driven labor movement.
But if we are to build the kind of labor movement capable of transforming society, of changing what is politically possible in Vermont and beyond, we now need you to give us a mandate to continue the work we have already begun. And to achieve this, we ask you to support the entire United! slate in the elections for Vermont AFL-CIO officers at our convention on Sept. 18 and 19 at Jay Peak, Northeast Kingdom.
