Biden’s Delivers Rousing Speech at the AFL-CIO Convention
From the People's World: Reiterating support for workers and unions, Democratic President Joe Biden went one step further at the AFL-CIO Convention in Philadelphia.
“I call on Congress to pass the PRO Act,” he declared, repeating a vow he’s used not just before union audiences but elsewhere, again backing the measure. “It’s not just because it’s pro-union, but because it’s pro-American.”
The Protect the Right to Organize (PRO) Act is the most pro-worker rewrite of U.S. labor law since the original 1935 National Labor Relations Act. It’s organized labor’s #1 legislative priority.
That Biden PRO Act line brought the house down from the capacity crowd in the city’s convention center on June 14, the third day of the conclave. It was also part of a strong section of Biden’s speech where he reminded listeners, and the U.S. as a whole, of the tough shape the nation was in when he took over from “my predecessor” and where it is now.
Biden also touted union-specific causes. Elating building trades members, he declared the new jobs in the “green economy” would be union jobs, including construction jobs via project labor agreements, with the workers paid prevailing wages.
That’s the pattern in the first such big agreement, for wind farms to generate power, sited off the Atlantic Coast. Biden’s Commerce Department estimates those could both lessen dependence on foreign oil—another point Biden made in the address—while also providing jobs with good incomes.
