Bernie Sanders secures first endorsement from national trade union

[David_42]

Good news for bernie.

Bernie Sanders received his first endorsement from a national trade union on Monday, throwing significant new organisational muscle behind a Democratic presidential candidate who is challenging Hillary Clinton’s natural support in the labour movement but lags far behind her in campaign infrastructure.

National Nurses United, which has 185,000 members nationally and is the profession’s largest representative, announced its backing for Sanders at a rally with him in Oakland, California.

The decision of its executive council to announce a formal endorsement follows a poll of members said to show widespread backing for his more radical policies on healthcare and social inequality.

Although the union is well-known as one of the more leftwing labor groups, its leaders claim to be surprised at the depth of support among their largely female membership given Clinton’s chance of becoming America’s first female president.

“When the pollsters said there was a landslide for Bernie Sanders, that didn’t make a lot of sense to me initially given the fact that Hillary Clinton is a woman,” director RoseAnn DeMoro told the Guardian in an interview ahead of the announcement. “I thought it would be fairly balanced, and it’s not.”

DeMoro would not disclose the internal polling numbers but said the three recent surveys represented a “pretty significant sampling” of the union’s members and she was “stunned at the level and depth of enthusiasm for Bernie”.

Until now, only one other national union, the American Federation of Teachers, has endorsed any of the Democratic candidates – coming out for Clinton in July – although some smaller, local union groups have shown support for Sanders.

Sanders thanked the nurses gathered at NNU headquarters, drawing on their experience of health inequality to reinforce his call for universal and affordable medical insurance.

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“I applaud you; you work hard every day but you understand that we have to do more to provide quality care that people need and for you to do your jobs in the way you want to see,” said Sanders. “You do not want to see patients not being able to afford the prescription drugs being written. You do not want to see people hesitating to walk into an office because they don’t have health insurance or because the deductibles are too high.”

But he also received loud applause for regaling the nurses with portions of his stump speech that point to much grander ambition.

“Our campaign is about creating a political revolution that says to the billionaire class they can’t have it all; this country, our government, belongs to all of us,” said Sanders. “It’s important that we think big.”

“We have to change boldly and fundamentally the priorities of our nation so that every American can experience the right to live with dignity and not so that almost all of our wealth and income is going to the top one per cent,” he added.

Richard Trumka, president of the national labor federation AFL-CIO, recently organised candidate interviews for union leaders to help shape their decision on an overall endorsement by the US labour movement, something many still expect to go to Clinton.

Bernie Sanders secures first endorsement from national trade union US news The Guardian

 

[Claudette]

Of course unions will like Sanders. They are as socialist as he is. No surprise there.

Hilbat will be pissed. LOL