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Running for Office: Have You Ever Thought About It?
I have spent the better part of the past decade asking elected leaders to vote the right way. Asking them to stand with us—as union workers, retirees, women, people of color and immigrants. I have done this by being in the streets, at rallies and protests, asking them to join us on the strike lines, and lobbying them in congressional offices, in our state legislature and in city halls.
Civil Rights | Global Worker Rights
Highlights from the AFL-CIO 2017 Diversity Pre-Conference and the Global Labor Symposium
Missouri House Rep. Bruce Franks Jr. addresses the AFL-CIO Diversity and Inclusion Conference ahead of the 2017 AFL-CIO Convention.
As part of its quadrennial convention, AFL-CIO is bringing together working families and activists to discuss diversity and inclusion and a separate meeting to discuss global labor issues. Here are some key Tweets from the "All of Us or None of Us: Join, Fight and Win Together Pre-Conference" and "Global Labor Symposium."
Infrastructure
Using Government Procurement to Bring Good Jobs Back to the U.S.
Marc Norberg is the assistant to the general president of International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers (SMART). He gave these remarks at the AFL-CIO Convention in St. Louis today.
I am pleased to have the opportunity to share SMART's work on Jobs to Move America and to talk about how we have used public procurement—or government purchasing—to re-shore good American manufacturing jobs.
Global Worker Rights
Brazil Undermines Labor Laws and Puts Women Workers at Great Risk
Paloma dos Santos, president of the Union of the Cleaning Services Workers of Santos City and Region (Sindilimpeza-Sindicato dos trabalhadores em asseio e conservação da baixada santista) from Brazil, is at the AFL-CIO 2017 Convention this week and is part of the Brazil-Kenya women's delegation.
Brazil's comprehensive labor laws have long provided a strong institutional framework for unions to defend workers' rights. Changes pushed through Congress this July by Brazil's un-elected president and a Congress compromised by corruption charges have greatly undermined the labor laws and will drastically change the legal context in which Brazil's unions work.
Tennessee SMART Members Donate Time for Veteran
On Sept. 21, International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers (SMART) Local 5 was notified that a local Chattanooga, Tennessee, veteran and his family had been left with an exposed metal roof by a shoddy local nonunion contractor.