Labor & Employment Law

Trumka: Massachusetts Voters Say Democrats Haven?t Gone Far Enough

By Tula Connell

When Massachusetts voters cast their ballots for Scott Brown on Tuesday, they were sending a message to Washington lawmakers that they have not gone far enough to create jobs, reform health care and fix our nation’s economy, says AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka. In a video message, Trumka says voters showed they don’t believe Democrats have overreached?they think that the Democrats underreached.

You see, they believe that Wall Street’s being taken care of. They believe that corporate America is being taken care of. They believe the insurers are being taken care of. But they don’t think that workers are being taken care of.

The corporate media is spinning the election results to make it appear that voters don’t want health care reform or funding for job creation. But as Trumka states: “Voters haven’t changed their mind. Their two top priorities are jobs and health care.”

Yesteday’s election gave us that opportunity. It said to everybody: “We don’t want excuses. We want action. We want you to fix these problems.”

It’s up to us to fight for those issues, because there’s nothing more important than creating an economy that works for average working people. There’s nothing more important than creating jobs, and there’s nothing more important than putting our people to work. Now’s the time for us to do that. It’s up to us to force both parties to fix the problems for working America.

Full post as published by AFL-CIO NOW BLOG on January 21, 2010 (boomark / email).