American Rights at Work has a great new ad in support of the Employee Free Choice Act. Apparently this ad was
shot in America’s oldest flag manufacturing company, where workers are members of a union and have the right to bargain collectively.

Educating on Employee Free Choice Act: EPIC FAIL.

As background Joe the Plumber Sam (not a plumber) was sent to Pennsylvania to stump against the Employee Free Choice Act, alongside Republican Senate candidate Pat Toomey and Big Business front group “Americans for Prosperity.” Of course it’s hard to convince people that they should listen to your opinion on a piece of legislation if you have no clue what the legislation does and does not do.

Representative Donna Edwards, in a live chat on FireDogLake, talked about the Employee Free Choice Act. Edwards is the most progressive member of Congress and a strong advocate for working Americans. Her case for Employee Free Choice was clear, as was her perspective on the opponents of the Employee Free Choice Act.

I know everyone has seen all the ads — slick, aggressive and a pack of untruths. The opposition claims that somehow workers won’t be able to choose a secret ballot — as though somehow a secret ballot with your employer standing over your shoulder makes the election legitimate. The Employee Free Choice Act is about workers choosing how they want to organize, either by signing up or casting a ballot — either way, it would be the workers’ choice and not the boss’.

While this series has focused on the merits of the Employee Free Choice Act, I think this political point from Rep. Edwards bears repeating.

We have problems on the Senate side on a lot of things. It’s time to call the bluff on the filibuster so we can pass important legislation with the majority we have. As long as we are held by the grips of fewer than a handful of quixotic Senators, it will be even tougher to get measures out of the House.

This is key. It’s clear that the debate on the Employee Free Choice Act is being waged on the margins with about 10 senators and no one else. These senators are only important because of the Republican use of the filibuster to stop proceding to debate on the Act in the Senate. As a result, a few swing votes are shaping the course of this critical election, when a clear majority supports the Act. Unless there’s a way around the Republican filibuster, it’s likely that working Americans will be handed a watered-down bill that doesn’t give them the rights and protections they need and deserve.

Christy Hardin Smith highlights some very important ways that the transition from a Bush presidency to the Obama presidency will impact workers in America. For the first time in eight years, the Department of Labor will be run by someone who understands working issues and supports the rights of America’s workers. This should mean oversight, investigation, and enforcement of current labor laws…and hopefully an increase in worker protections in the future. From child labor violations, to worker safety violations, to illegal firings and intimidation in the face of union organizing, there’s a lot of work to be done when it comes to giving workers the executive branch they deserve.

Sam Stein of Huffington Post has the latest Gallup Poll, which shows strong bipartisan support for the Employee Free Choice Act in the American public.

Gallup Surveys released a study on Tuesday finding that 53 percent of respondents favored a new law that would “make it easier for labor unions to organize workers.” Only 39 percent of respondents opposed such a law.

When asked how important it was that Congress pass such a law, 26 percent of respondents said “very,” 29 percent said “somewhat,” 23 percent said “not too important,” and 20 percent said “not important at all.”

Added up, the findings provide a solid boost to EFCA backers, with 55 percent expressing some desire to see Congress act on the legislation and 43 percent expressing a level of opposition or ambivalence (three percent said they had no opinion).

Hopefully this sort of strong support will be an impetus for legislators in Congress to drive forward with this popular legislation.

Christopher Beam of Slate has one of the best run-downs of the Big Lie used by the opponents of Employee Free Choice, namely the “secret ballot” question. It’s too long and thorough to lend itself to quoting, so I recommend you read Beam’s piece. But this passage is certainly critical:

Even though employers are free to recognize a union without an election, in practice they almost always request an election: Why recognize a union before they have to? Requesting an election also gives them more time to lobby against unionization.

The essential change of the EFCA would be to allow the employees—rather than the employer—to decide whether to hold a secret-ballot election. If at least half of the work force signed cards saying it wanted a union, there would be a union—without the rigmarole of a full-blown election.

Ed Schultz on MSNBC makes a very, very clear case on why the Employee Free Choice Act must pass.

This is a simple one: more than 25% of all union elections this campaign have resulted in illegal firings of workers who wanted to unionize their workplace. David Sirota points out that this is exactly why we need the Employee Free Choice Act. This wouldn’t be possible if workers got to decide when and how they formed a union.

It’s hard to look at the quotes in SEIU’s “Scary Movie” video and not take note of the fact that Big Business and the GOP leadership are engaging in class warfare against working Americans. D-Day writes:

Apparently, allowing workers making something approaching the minimum wage the ability to collectively bargain instead of having their rights trampled by management, their organizers fired, their workplaces shut down rather than stay a union shop, and their colleagues intimidated is the central threat to the very fabric of American life. Hearing these landed gentry talk using the language of end-times apocalypse is pretty nuts.

My coworkers at SEIU have made a great video about the Employee Free Choice Act and the scare tactics used by big business groups and conservative Republicans.

Take Action: http://action.seiu.org/ceo