Richard Trumka, president of one of the largest union organizations in the country, stifled the irritation he might have felt towards the Senate Democrats who failed to pass the American Jobs Act, instead blasting Republicans for “obstruction” of the bill.
Trumka released a statement, after the American Jobs Act failed in the Democrat-controlled Senate, calling Republican opposition “appalling” and charging the Senate GOP with “seek[ing] to profit politically from the country’s pain.”
Trumka mentioned Senate Republicans three times, and even worked in a reference to former President Bush, but he overlooked the Democrats who opposed Obama’s jobs proposal. Even so, he called for union members to “ask each [senator] who voted no — ‘what is your plan?'”
Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont. and Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., – both vulnerable Democrats up for reelection in 2012 – voted against the bill, while Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., said he would vote against the bill should it have come to a final vote. Trumka accused the Republicans of having “shamefully distorted priorities that place partisan gain over economic security,” but did not comment on Lieberman, Nelson and Tester’s priorities.
Nor did Trumka address the decision of Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., to block a vote on the American Jobs Act with President Obama’s tax increases. Reid interdicted an up-or-down vote on the package when it appeared that Senate Democrats would break ranks and vote with Republicans against the bill.
Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., for instance, wanted to protect tax subsidies for oil companies, even suggesting that Obama’s willingness to pay for the spending bill at the expense of oil companies might be “just for his election.” Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., called Obama’s proposed tax increases “terrible,” and Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-NY, also criticized Obama’s pay-fors, saying the president would raise taxes on people who “are not rich.”
If Trumka wants the American Jobs Act passed, he might drum up union pressure on the Democrats who opposed the jobs bill over the last several weeks. Democrats, after all, tend to be more susceptible to union pressure than Republicans. If he prefers to serve as a mouthpiece for the Democratic Party, he should keep hiding the bipartisan opposition to Obama’s latest stimulus plan from the members of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations.
