Democrats appeal to working people after union boss' surprising speech at GOP convention

Democrats need to reconnect with working people, party leaders in Arizona said, after a top union boss addressed the Republican National Convention at the invitation of former President Donald Trump.

Teamsters President Sean O'Brien gave a fiery address to Republicans on Monday in Milwaukee, telling the GOP crowd that the Teamsters are not beholden to any political party and calling on politicians to support workers’ rights. The move was unconventional: O’Brien is the first Teamsters president to address the RNC and the move comes after his 1.3 million member union endorsed President Joe Biden in 2020.

O’Brien’s appearance raised eyebrows among Arizona Democrats, especially because the Teamsters have not yet endorsed a candidate in the 2024 presidential race.

“This is something that we're going to have to continue to work on within our unions to help folks understand that there's a lot at stake, that the presidency under Donald Trump would be an attack on our unions and our workers’ rights,” Arizona Democratic Party chair Yolanda Bejarano said Tuesday at a news conference in Phoenix.

"Biden has been the most pro-union president ever," she said. "He was on the picket line and he is making sure that unions have the power to do what they do, which is to lift people out of poverty. When unions do good, everybody else does good.”

O'Brien boosted labor law and called for corporate welfare reform during his time on stage in Milwaukee. He knocked big companies such as Amazon, Uber, Lyft and Walmart for the lack of benefits offered to their employees, a surprising corporate takedown to hear in a Republican venue.

Democratic state Rep. Stacey Travers said that she supports the Teamsters but has noticed a political "disconnect." She noted that Republican lawmakers voted against legislation to protect the pensions of Teamsters workers, while Democrats supported the bill and prevented pensions from being slashed.

The Biden administration announced in 2022 that it would use $36 billion from the American Rescue Plan to shore up the union pension plan.

“My question to the Teamsters leader is: Every single Democrat in Congress voted to protect the pensions of 350,000 Teamsters from being cut by 65%. Every single Republican voted no,” Travers said. “So I think that's something that we need to look at. Why there seems to be a disconnect and why he would want to represent in a venue where he wasn't being supported.”

The newfound friendliness between Trump and the Teamsters is another challenge for Democrats in the crucial battleground of Arizona. Most Arizona workers are non-union, part of small businesses and often not aligned with union-thinking. Few people in the state see Biden and Democrats as allies of working people given inflation and rising gas prices and rents over the last several years.

“When we asked about rating economic conditions in Arizona, 79% of respondents told us that the economy was no better than fair if not poor,” said Siena College pollster Don Levy, who surveyed registered voters in Arizona in the spring for The New York Times.

Trump’s new running mate, Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, also strikes a more populist tone than traditional Republicans. Vance visited a United Auto Workers picket line when the union went on strike last year, like Biden did, and has supported antitrust enforcement and breaking up Big Tech.

“President Trump is making lasting inroads with union leaders and broadening the Republican tent in a historic way,” RNC spokesperson Anna Kelly said in a written statement. “Hardworking Americans are struggling from Biden’s out-of-control inflation, unaffordable housing costs, and soaring gas prices. President Trump has always supported working class families with his America First Policies, and he will deliver again when we send him back to the White House.”

Democratic leaders in Milwaukee made the economy and workers a central component of their RNC rebuttal Tuesday in a news conference.

AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler that Vance’s appearance at that picket line was politically motivated and said talk by the Trump campaign about having support from unions and middle class Americans is just "spin."

Biden “was the first sitting American president to walk a union picket line,” Shuler said. “JD Vance showed up for the first time ever. … And it was basically in preparation for his political career.”

Wisconsin Democratic Party Chair Ben Wikler said that Trump’s term brought “broken promises and empty rhetoric” to his state, pointing to a Trump-backed effort by the technology company Foxconn to expand its operations in Milwaukee that failed to deliver on key promises despite public investment.

"They pretended that they are a pro-worker, pro-union party. But … America saw right through their act,” said Quentin Fulks, a Biden-Harris deputy campaign manager.

Democrats also used the controversial Project 2025 this week to make their economic case against Trump. The wide-ranging policy agenda for a second Trump administration was written by a conservative think-tank that is staffed with a number of Trump allies. The former president has distanced himself from the plan, saying “I know nothing about Project 2025” and “I have no idea who is behind it.”

Still, Democrats are tying it to Trump and say voters should take it seriously. One portion of the policy proposal says “Congress should also consider whether public-sector unions are appropriate in the first place.”

“To say it plainly, Trump’s Project 2025 seeks to destroy public service unions and the freedoms to negotiate contracts, the freedoms to negotiate better benefits. That would all be taken away,” said Roman Ulman, the president of the AFSCME Arizona Retirees. “President Biden said it very clearly. This is malarkey.”

“I would call it bull,” Ulman added.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Democrats appeal to working people after union boss speech at RNC