Teamsters Union decide not to endorse a candidate for President.
In a surprising turn of events lately the Teamster Union, one of the most popular labor unions in the U.S., has stated that they will not endorse a candidate for the election in the 2024 race. This has come to quite a shock to many as this will be the first time they haven't endorsed a candidate in decades. What happened and why was the decision made? Let's break it down.
In a surprising announcement on September 18th the Teamsters Union made the announcement declined to endorse a candidate for President in the 2024 race. The official statement from the union over the decision stated that they couldn't endorse a candidate, because neither candidate could make the commitments they were seeking in regards to the working class. This however does not seem to be the whole story as there is apparently more going on behind the scenes.The union has typically endorsed Democratic candidates in elections, supporting individuals such as Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama. However, recently the union put out a poll asking it's members asking which candidate the union should support. The results of the poll showed surprising numbers with 60% of preferring Trump while 34% preferred Harris. Both sides reacted to this news with different tactics. The Trump campaign capitalized on the results stating that members of the union wanted Trump back in office. The Harris campaign on the other had pointed to the fact that many local chapter have already voiced their support for Harris.
This is an interesting turn of events to say the least. I am surprised that the Union has opted for staying neutral in this campaign, given its history in previous general elections. I think this really does exhibit their dislike for each candidate, and may I go as far to say maybe underlying prejudices? I only mention this because this post piqued my interest, so I went to NPR and found the polls that revealed the candidates the members supported. There seemed to be a favored candidate, which was Joe Biden, who displayed an eight-point lead against Donald Trump. While looking at Kamala versus Trump, Trump displayed a 25-point lead. I am interested to see where this jump comes from. I may be jaded from the 2016 election, but the polls are not looking good. Thank you for sharing this!
ReplyDeleteGreat post! This is a very interesting read on an important topic. Teamsters has been on the democratic ticket since the 80s and it is alarming to see that they have chosen to stay nuetral. This should shoot off alarm bells throughout the democratic party, and for good reason. Trump has seen this non-endorsement as an endorsement. Trump sees this playing to his advantage, as the internal polling within teamster showed him as the prefered candidate. We will see how much this impacts the union vote soon!
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