October 3, 2007
AFT Endorses Hillary Clinton
Filed under: Education by Leo Casey @ 4:59 pm
The following statement has been released by our national union, the American Federation of Teachers.
Acting on behalf of its more than 1.4 million members, the AFT executive council on Wednesday endorsed Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination for president, citing her proven ability to advance our nation’s key priorities, and her bold plans for a stronger America.
“Our members have told us that they want a leader they can trust to strengthen public education, increase access to health care, promote commonsense economic priorities and secure America’s place in the world,” said AFT president Edward J. McElroy. “Hillary Clinton is that leader.”
Clinton thanked the AFT executive council for the union’s endorsement and said that, as president, she will be “committed to improving and strengthening our public schools, providing support for teachers, and ensuring our education system is able to meet the needs of the global economy and that we have commonsense laws that make that possible.”
Clinton added that she looks forward to working with the AFT to ensure that all Americans have affordable, quality health insurance; to protect the right of workers to organize and bargain collectively; and to strengthen pension systems and retirement security.
The vote of the 41-member AFT executive council capped a deliberative seven-month process designed to solicit from membership their issues of concern and the candidate they believed would best address those concerns. As part of that effort, the AFT created the “You Decide 2008″ page on its Web site, which to date has received more than 50,000 individual visits. AFT leadership also solicited input through meetings at the local level, regional caucuses and individual member outreach.
The AFT invited all the major presidential candidates to meet with its executive council. The seven major Democratic candidates accepted the invitation and individually participated in an extensive question-and-answer session with the council, and with rank-and-file members in attendance. All of the announced candidates also were asked to respond to an AFT candidate questionnaire.
Each of the major Republican candidates also was invited to participate, but all either declined or did not respond to the invitation.
“The candidates we met with have an impressive depth of experience and commitment to strengthening America,” McElroy said. “With so many strong candidates focused on the needs of America’s working families, it was really an embarrassment of riches. In the end, our members and leaders determined that Hillary Clinton is the strongest leader to advance these causes.”
Clinton said that the AFT’s “support and leadership will be invaluable to the success of my campaign.”
She also praised McElroy for his leadership, saying, “For over 40 years, Ed has been a proud trade unionist and champion for teachers, students and the basic ideal that all children have the right to a good education.”
The AFT endorsement activates the union’s considerable member education and political mobilization program on behalf of the endorsed candidate. The AFT immediately will put in motion a grass-roots campaign to engage its members throughout the country to help nominate Hillary Clinton.
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[...] I bring this up because the AFT endorsed Hillary today. Why did they do it? I’m not in the inner circle or a good enough analyst of inside stuff to [...]
Pingback by AFT endorses Hillary. Yawn. « PREA Prez — October 3, 2007 @ 7:03 pm
[re-posting a misplaced comment]
Glad to hear we endorsed the Democratic candidate who is most anti-union, most beholden to corporate interests, and most closely tied to those responsible for driving the Democratic party into the ground during the 1990’s. Not to mention that her political baggage gives her almost no chance of bringing substantive change to Washington, even if she were so inclined.
Every now and then I think about making COPE contributions and then something like this comes along to jolt me back into sanity (Last time it was the phone calls urging me to vote for one of Clarence Norman’s pals that did it).
Are we really to believe the AFT made this endorsement by soliciting opinions from members?
Comment by MichaelB — October 3, 2007 @ 8:59 pm
The wonderful thing about the human mind, Michael, is that you are free to believe whatever you like. The facts are that the AFT conducted a number of polls of the membership before a decision was made, and Hillary was the favorite by a wide margin, better than two to one. In New York, the margin was even higher.
Comment by Leo Casey — October 3, 2007 @ 10:16 pm
Yay, go Hillary! I think all the Democratic candidates are strong but Hillary is my favorite, as well as the favorite among all of my friends. This will surely bring out the concern trolls but I’m glad we took a stand.
Comment by bluedaisy — October 3, 2007 @ 11:19 pm
Leo,
what was the decision-making process? The AFT leadership can look at polls, but are we committed to making endorsements based on membership polls?
Jonathan
Comment by jd2718 — October 4, 2007 @ 7:36 am
Jonathan:
The process is that endorsements are made at the level of the union that corresponds to the office. Thus, in a mayoral election, the UFT makes the endorsement; in a gubernatorial election, our state union, NYSUT, makes the endorsement; and in a national election, the national union, the AFT, makes the endorsement.
There are two national decision making bodies — the Convention which meets every second year [it last met in Boston in July 2006 before anyone know who was running], and the Executive Council, which is made up of the AFT officers — there are many vice presidents from state federations and large locals around the country. Given the issue of timeliness, the Executive Council had to be the body to make an endorsement, if it were to be made, since the nomination would be over by the time the next convention meets, in July 2008.
The Executive Council had discussions on what to do, of the pluses and minuses of an endorsement now. That is a discussion of principle AND strategy. The Council took into consideration not only the polls it had conducted and what its members reported back on the sentiments of their members, but the fact that the NYSUT convention had voted overwhelmingly in its April convention this year [with NY being a very large portion of AFT membership] to urge the AFT to endorse Hillary Clinton.
Leo
Comment by Leo Casey — October 4, 2007 @ 11:33 am
Leo,
Thanks for the facts, but they don’t address my concerns. I wasn’t trying to imply that the AFT was going against the wishes of its members. I was questioning its characterization of the endorsement process as being member driven. I’m sorry you can’t provide information about the leadership’s internal debate over the pros and cons of endorsing the different candidates or the discussions the AFT leaders had with these candidates. It would have been interesting to learn.
But I wish I hadn’t made that offhand remark. If I was going to spark discussion, I would have wanted it to be about the wisdom of endorsing someone from the anti-union wing of the Democratic party.
Comment by MichaelB — October 4, 2007 @ 6:36 pm