How can you send our kids to Iraq and our jobs to Mexico on the same day?
IUE/CWA LOCAL 201 Takes Anti-Outsourcing Backlash to New Hampshire
by Jeff Crosby, IUE Local 201, Lynn Massachusetts
September 13th, 2004
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How can you send our kids to Iraq and our jobs to Mexico on the same day?
IUE/CWA LOCAL 201 Takes Anti-Outsourcing Backlash to New Hampshire
The backlash by the American people against globalization and outsourcing has become a topic in corporate boardrooms. According to the Asia Times of March 13, "Multinational corporations including General Electric and Gillette spent the week discussing the backlash?as a risk factor and its impact on their businesses."
Last week Local 201 and the New Hampshire AFL-CIO brought the backlash to New Hampshire. The message to Senator Judd Gregg at his Manchester office was powerful and clear: "Why should we pay for the destruction of our own livelihood? How does shipping the most advanced defense technology overseas make the world a safer place? How can you send our kids to Iraq and our jobs to Mexico on the same day?" Gregg voted on June 22 to increase the number of countries who can receive US defense jobs with no restrictions.
The New Hampshire AFL-CIO provided critical leadership and support, and members of a dozen New Hampshire unions turned out. President Mark McKenzie and Dexter Arnold are long-time friends of Local 201. Arnold remembers working with Local 201 on the P-9 Meatcutters strike in Minnesota in 1986 and the Decatur, Ill. "War Zone" strikes in the mid-1990s. The protest had originally hoped to attract 30 people turned out more than 75. New Hampshire television and news covered the protest. IBEW 1505 at Raytheon, IBEW 1837, SEIU 1984, the National Writers Union, Laborers 668, AFSCME 948 (from Salem State), Boilermakers 29, UNITE, Ironworkers 474, Manchester Postal Workers, Mailhandlers 301, Food and Commercial Workers, and the Metal Trades Council (Portsmouth Naval Shipyard) all sent members to the picket line.
Long active in Massachusetts politics, Local 201 reached out to our 200 members living further north. The local 201 Legislative Committee phone-banked New Hampshire members urging them to call Sen. Gregg. Leo LeBlanc from Newton, NH, and Steve Gauthier from Salem, NH spoke to the crowd about the effect of foreign outsourcing on their jobs at Ametek and GE. Ametek laid off member Kathy Twomey and Gauthier were interviewed on WNDS (Channel 50). The goal was to publicize Gregg's support for increasing foreign outsourcing of defense work and pressure him to turn his vote around.
Local 201 is spreading the word as far as possible, trying to get unions in other states to put the heat on while the "Build American" job protections in the Defense Budget are being debated in the House Senate Conference Committee in Congress.
Local 201 is also taking the fight into the Presidential election. While Bush has threatened to veto the Defense Budget if it contains job protections, Senator Kerry has written to Local 201 to support the language and voted for it. The Asia Times article mentioned above also stated, "GE expressed its fear that if anti-offshoring moves initiated by Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry become legislation, GE?s low-cost operations outside the US could be forced to halt."
BUSH vs. KERRY ON OUR DEFENSE JOBS, 2005
Senator John Kerry:
The outcome of the debate over 'Buy America' language in the current National Defense Authorization bill will have a significant impact on American jobs and our continues leadership in defense technology. As I stated when I addressed the national convention of the CWA last year, I, along with senator Kennedy, support the Build America protections in the Defense Bill and stand ready to help in this fight.
---Excerpted from letter to President Crosby July23, 2004
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President George W. Bush:
Competitive Sourcing. The Administration strongly opposes sections "which significantly limit Department of Defense's flexibility on competitive sourcing" .If the final version of the bill contains such provisions, the President's senior advisors will recommend that he veto the bill.
Trade Provision. The Administration opposes section 811, which would prohibit Department of Defense from entering into contracts or subcontracts to procure defense items or services from a foreign firm, if the nation within which that firm is located requires offsets when procuring defense material from U.S. suppliers.
--Excerpted from Statement of Administration Policy, Executive Office of the President, May 19, 2004
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