The unions representing construction workers throughout the United States have endorsed President Biden for reelection. Presidential politics dominated the North American Building Trades Unions’ (NABTU) two-day legislative conference in held in Washington, D.C., April 23–24, capped off by a powerful speech by Biden.
The endorsement sets legions of construction workers free to stump the streets for Biden this fall. NABTU also unveiling a television ad, going after former Republican President Trump. The ad states, “Donald Trump is incapable of running anything, let alone the most powerful country in the history of the world. And God help us if he gets anywhere near that White House in the future.”
In his remarks, Biden took many sharp jabs at Trump—by name, for once—and sounded the same contrasts. He lauded unions and workers and put his pro-worker record up against Trump’s failed promises. The crowd responded with repeated cheers, applause and laughter at Biden’s taunts.
The president even voiced a class contrast, of the “Scranton values”—referencing Biden’s birthplace—of hard work with Trump’s “Mar-a-Lago values” as “competing visions of America.”
“We all grew up with folks who sort of looked down on us because of what our dads did,” Biden reminisced. “People like Donald Trump learned a different lesson. He learned the best way to get rich is inherit. He learned that paying taxes is something working people did, not him. He learned that telling people ‘You’re fired’ was something to laugh about.
“Not in my household. Not in my neighborhood...Especially being fired, because you had no protection.”
Biden did not specify what “protection” means, but he repeated his vow to push and sign the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act. That measure, labor’s top legislative priority, would give workers much more legal protection against corporate exploitation.
“I guess that’s how you look at the world from Mar-a-Lago, where Trump and his rich friends embrace the same failed trickle-down policies that have failed working-class families and union families for over 40 years,” the president said. “But if you grew up where we grew up, nobody handed you anything. Being told you were fired wasn’t entertainment. It was devastating. It was a nightmare.
“And, folks, we all know people like Trump who look down on us, don’t we? We all know somebody we grew up with like that...When I look at the economy, I don’t see it through the eyes of Mar-a-Lago, I see it through the eyes of Scranton and working people like all of you and my family...My dad used to say not a whole hell of a lot trickled down on his kitchen table in that top-down policy.”
The building trades ad opens with the now-infamous Trump promise to a Fox News host that “I’ll be a dictator only on day one” if elected this fall in the rematch against Biden. Nobody believes a Trump dictatorship will stop only after next Inauguration Day.
“Donald Trump. He’s not a good man. He’s not a good person,” says NABTU President Sean McGarvey. “He doesn’t care about anybody in this world except Donald Trump. That’s it. That’s all.” Then comes a video clip of Trump stalking to his car with background words “a clear and present danger.”
Trump, of course, proved that charge when he ordered, aided and abetted the Trumpite invasion, insurrection and attempted coup d’etat at the U.S. Capitol in January 2021. The ad does not include footage of the chaos and carnage there. It doesn’t need to; it shows other Trump chaos.
“Now he’s looking to get in that position again to exert revenge on people,” McGarvey continues. “I go all the way back to the '80s with Donald Trump. Trying to get his mug on Page Six of the New York Post. The only difference between Donald Trump of the '80s and Donald Trump of today is he feels totally free to let his dark side out, and it’s very very dark and very very dangerous for this country.”
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Photo Courtesy of North America's Building Trades Unions LIve Stream https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KxadBjeTbBk
