The 500 delegates to the AFSCME Council 31 political endorsement conference voted overwhelmingly to adopt this resolution urging members to vote for Gov. Pat Quinn to defeat anti-worker billionaire Bruce Rauner.
Original Title
AFSCME delegates resolution on Illinois governor's race
The 500 delegates to the AFSCME Council 31 political endorsement conference voted overwhelmingly to adopt this resolution urging members to vote for Gov. Pat Quinn to defeat anti-worker billionaire Bruce Rauner.
The 500 delegates to the AFSCME Council 31 political endorsement conference voted overwhelmingly to adopt this resolution urging members to vote for Gov. Pat Quinn to defeat anti-worker billionaire Bruce Rauner.
RESOLUTION ADOPTED BY THE DELEGATES TO THE AFSCME PEOPLE
CONFERENCESEPTEMBER 13, 2014
WHEREAS: Republican gubernatorial candidate Bruce Rauner has launched an unrelenting, dishonest and mean-spirited attack on public employees and their unions; and
WHEREAS: Bruce Rauner has made clear his deep-seated hostility to workers rights, whether in the public or private sector, calling for the establishment of Right-to-Work zones in Illinois, which would drastically undermine the economic security of working people; and
WHEREAS: Bruce Rauner is trampling on a long tradition going back to Abraham Lincoln of Illinois Republicans who respected working people and honest labor, including support for the right to collective bargaining; and
WHEREAS: Bruce Rauner has repeatedly attacked the very existence of unions that represent teachers, sanitation workers, correctional officers, caregivers, firefighters, and other public employees, stating that in his view, by their nature...theyre immoral; and
WHEREAS: Bruce Rauner is a hedge fund billionaire who made a good part of his vast wealth from public pension funds, but now argues that public pensions should be completely abolished; and
WHEREAS: Bruce Rauner has a documented record as a cutthroat venture capitalist who operated private care facilities that were found to have caused unnecessary suffering and death to hundreds of their elderly and disabled residents; who bought up companies and shipped their jobs overseas; and who sought to cheat his workers out of the wages and benefits they had earned; and
WHEREAS: Bruce Rauners campaign is based on a web of lies and half-truths which mask an agenda that would slash funding for education, shift the tax burden from the wealthy to middle income families, and cut the wages of hundreds of thousands of working people; and
WHEREAS: Bruce Rauner owns nine homes and belongs to a wine club that costs $140,000 annually just to join, yet rails against the modest pay and benefits of public employees; and
WHEREAS: Bruce Rauner says he will cut the pay and benefits of public employees, vowing to force them out on strike to impose his will; and
WHEREAS: Bruce Rauner represents a profound threat to the decent standard of living and basic workplace rights that AFSCME members have fought so hard to attain; and
WHEREAS: AFSCME Council 31 has pledged to do everything possible to defeat Bruce Rauner; and
WHEREAS: Critical to defeating Bruce Rauner is ensuring that as many citizens as possible cast their votes for Democratic gubernatorial candidate, Pat Quinn; and
WHEREAS: The serious differences that AFSCME has had with Governor Quinn over the past four years cannot stand as a barrier to taking the necessary actions to defeat Bruce Rauner.
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED: That AFSCME Council 31 recommends support for Pat Quinn for governor of the State of Illinois.