Teamsters Endorse Al Gore

W A S H I N G T O N, Sept. 7, 2000 -- Al Gore can breathe a sigh of relief.

The 1.5 million-member Teamsters union has endorsed his presidential bid by a unanimous decision of its general executive board.

The Teamsters executive board met today on a conference call to make the decision.

Swing State Boost

The union is a potent force in several battleground states that Gore needs to win the White House. Until now, the prospects that the union could sit out the presidential election or even hand its endorsement to GOP candidate George W. Bush seemed very real.

Both campaigns have actively courted the union. Republicans even feted Teamsters president James P. Hoffa at their nominating convention last month. And in recent weeks, Gore and Bush have each spoken with Hoffa.

A spokesman says the the formal announcement is expected to take place at the union’s Unity Meeting in Las Vegas on Sept. 18.

The Teamsters, who supported GOP presidential candidates throughout the 1980s before backing President Clinton in the ’90s, have not been shy in expressing their disgust with the Gore camp this summer.

Stung by the vice president’s support for the North American Free Trade Agreement and, more recently, Permanent Normal Trading Relations for China — two measures organized labor fought to defeat — the union opted out of the AFL-CIO’s early Gore endorsement in October. The AFL-CIO’s backing was viewed as critical to Gore’s success in brushing aside primary challenger Bill Bradley.

Talking Tough

The bad blood came to a head when Gore tapped Commerce Secretary Bill Daley to chair his campaign, a move union leaders considered a “slap in the face.”

Daley, viewed by organized labor as ardently pro-business, has since reached out to local union leaders, and Gore himself met with AFL-CIO President John Sweeney to try to assuage labor’s concerns.

In June, union leader James P. Hoffa had been blunt in warning the Gore camp not to take the Teamsters’ support for granted.

“We are very powerful and Al Gore cannot get elected without organized labor,” he said.

Both publicly and privately, Hoffa and his Teamster brethren had made no secret about their disappointment with the vice president. Hoffa had demanded that Gore “articulate a comprehensive policy with regard to organized labor,” adding “there has been a complete absence of discussion on how do we keep jobs in this country.”

Since then, Gore has recast himself as a populist defender of the working class.

Union spokesman Bret Caldwell said, “Since the convention, Vice President Gore has articulated a message to the American people that is pro-working families… He is going to do the best thing by the American worker as president of the United States.”

As for enthusiasm for the vice president among the rank-and-file membership, Caldwell says,“I think you will see that the Teamsters are going to be 100 percent behind Al Gore.”