Near Clean-Sweep for Labor-Endorsed Candidates & Issues

(Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO)Metro-area labor’s endorsed candidates and initiatives scored a near clean-sweep Tuesday. President Obama won handily in DC and Maryland, as expected, and once again carried swing-state Virginia, where labor conducted extensive voter ID and GOTV efforts that were part of a national Democratic/labor ground game that defeated a massive GOP and right-wing funded ad blitz.

Maryland: In addition to wins by labor-endorsed candidates Ben Cardin (U.S. Senate), Dutch Ruppersberger (CD 2), John Sarbanes (CD 3), Donna Edwards (CD 4), Steny Hoyer (CD 5), John Delaney (CD 6), Elijah Cummings (CD 7) and Chris Van Hollen (CD 8), all the labor-supported referenda passed, including Question 4 (Dream Act), Question 5 (Re-Districting), Question 6 (Marriage Equality) and Question 7 (Gaming). Montgomery County’s Ballot Question B (Effects Bargaining For Police Employees) was approved, in a defeat for labor, and while results had not yet been finalized in the Prince George’s County Board of Education races, endorsed candidates Edward Burroughs and Carletta Fellows appear to have won, but Clifford Savoy lost his race for the Calvert County School Board.

District of Columbia: Eleanor Holmes Norton won as U.S. House Delegate, while in the DC City Council, labor-endorsed candidates Jack Evans (Ward 2), Muriel Bowser (Ward 4), Yvette Alexander (Ward 7), Marion Barry (Ward 8), Vincent Orange (At-Large) and Phil Mendelson (Chairman) won, but Michael Brown (At-Large) lost.

Virginia: In what NoVA Labor president Dan Duncan modestly called a “pretty good evening overall,” labor’s wins included Tim Kaine (U.S. Senate), Jim Moran (CD 8), and Gerry Connolly (CD 11), while Adam Cook (CD 1) and Kristin Cabral (CD 10) lost. The labor-endorsed slate won in the City of Alexandria: Mayor William Euille, and City Council member Paul Smedberg, Allison Silberberg, John Taylor Chapman, Del Pepper, Justin Wilson and Tim Lovain.

- photos: Unite Here 25 member Shondra Alston doorknocks in Burke, VA (above); Metro Council Assistant Legislative/Political Coordinator Alya Solomon (l) and Union Cities Assistant Mobilizer Julia Kann call Virginia union voters at the AFL-CIO phonebank(below); photos by Chris Garlock