Why a union president crossed partisan lines for a starring role at Trump’s RNC convention

By CNN

Published July 15, 2024 9:20 PM

CNN

Analysis by Zachary B. Wolf, CNN

(CNN) — It was a remarkable moment Monday night at the Republican National Convention, surely creating some amount of confusion among longtime Republicans, when Sean O’Brien, president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, delivered a stemwinder of a speech in prime time. He called former President Donald Trump a “tough S.O.B.”

O’Brien did not endorse Trump, but he leaned into the incongruity of speaking at the convention of a party that has long fought workers’ ability to organize. The union could vote to endorse a candidate later this year.

“The Teamsters are doing something correct if the extremes in both parties think I shouldn’t be on this stage,” O’Brien said, adding that the union has endorsed Republican presidents Richard Nixon and George H.W. Bush in the past. This year, the Teamsters may not endorse any candidate, even though Biden has fashioned himself as the most pro-labor president in US history. Biden became the first president to join a picket line, when he appeared with striking auto workers in Michigan in 2023.

“At the end of the day, the Teamsters are not interested if you have a “D,” “R” or an “I” next to your name. We want to know one thing,” O’Brien said. “What are you doing to help American workers?”

Appearing Tuesday on “Inside Politics,” O’Brien told CNN’s Dana Bash he would speak at both conventions, but has not yet been invited to the Democratic convention.

“The partisanship is not working. We need bipartisan support, we need bipartisan cooperation,” O’Brien said, adding he would definitely speak at the Democratic convention.

This after Biden bailed out a Teamster pension fund

Biden must be particularly frustrated by O’Brien’s speech since as president in 2022, he OK’d a $36 billion, one-time bailout of a Teamsters pension fund, warding off pension cuts for 350,000 workers and retirees. While Biden has the endorsement of key labor organizations like the AFL-CIO, there’s growing concern among many labor leaders about his ability to win in November.

Bash pointed out Trump’s long history of opposing union rights, which O’Brien did not dispute.

“If we’re not having the discussions, how can we change people’s opinions?” he asked.

Republicans generally oppose organized labor, but JD Vance joined a picket line

During his speech Monday night O’Brien acknowledged the anti-union bent of much of the GOP and said it needs to change. That could take a while. Also Monday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Elon Musk, the anti-union Tesla boss who has endorsed Trump, would be showering a pro-Trump super PAC with $45 million per month in cash.

But it is notable, as O’Brien pointed out, that a handful of Republican senators, including Trump’s new running mate Sen. JD Vance, have joined picket lines in recent years. Vance and other Republican senators, however, oppose the Democrats’ proposal to pass a nationwide law, the Protecting the Right to Organize Act, supported by labor unions including the Teamsters.

Also, the selection of Vance, who also spent years as a Silicon Valley Venture Capitalist, was praised by Musk.

An anti-corporate message directed at workers, but an anti-union legacy for Trump

If there was an overriding theme in speeches at the first night of the Republican convention, which were supposed to focus on Make America Wealthy Again, it was an anti-corporate and anti-elitist message, with frequent mentions of helping workers. That’s in keeping with Trump’s appeal to those who feel marginalized and left behind.

Despite Trump’s longtime pro-worker rhetoric, his record as president was decidedly anti-union, as CNN’s Chris Isidore has written.

The help Republicans were offering for workers at the RNC Monday, from a policy standpoint, is indirect. They’re not endorsing raising the minimum wage, as Democrats have long supported. Trump is, on the other hand, pushing an idea to exempt tips from taxes. Many states allow employers to pay workers who get tips below that state’s minimum wage.

Trump and Vance’s answer to helping auto workers is to end Democrats’ emissions goals, which are meant to pivot the US toward more electric vehicles. The United Auto Workers is among the unions to endorse Biden.

Marginal shifts are meaningful

In an election that may yet be decided by marginal shifts in the electorate, any movement toward Trump among union households could spell disaster for Biden, who performed better in 2020 than Hillary Clinton in 2016 among union households both nationally and in key states.

O’Brien has a brash persona. He made headlines for nearly coming to fisticuffs with Sen. Markwayne Mullin, a Republican from Oklahoma who also happens to have been a professional mixed martial arts fighter.

In a nod to that episode, O’Brien namechecked Mullin and said he was paraphrasing the senator with this line: “‘It’s time for both sides of Congress to stand their butts up.’ We need trade policies that put American workers first. It needs to be easier for companies to remain in America. We need legal protections that make it safer for workers to get a contract.”

On the other hand, it’s worth going back to that original standoff between Mullin and O’Brien, in which Mullin complained that a union had tried to infiltrate his plumbing business. That sounds a little more to type when you’re considering traditional Republican views of unions.

In Wisconsin, where the convention is taking place, the former Republican Gov. Scott Walker made a career out of busting government worker unions in his state until he lost a bid for reelection in 2018.

Walker did enact so-called “right to work” legislation opposed by unions by making it easier for employees to work for companies without paying union dues even when there is a collective bargaining agreement. Multiple US states, most of them dominated by Republicans, have such legislation.

There are many different types of unions and they each have different priorities. Police unions are going to see things differently than auto workers. Trump’s promise to abolish taxes on tips seems tailored to gain some marginal support in Nevada, where he announced the proposal. Government worker unions are a strong part of the labor movement and unlikely to be getting any overtures from a new Trump administration, which has tried to paint the federal bureaucracy as an organized deep state opposed to him.

But small movements among certain union members could have a huge impact in November.

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