Conservative Unions Backs Conservative Candidates-- Let's Look At Hawaii's Senate Race

Hanabusa with her longtime friend, anti-gay legislator Sam Slom (the only GOP State Senator in Hawai`i). She calls him "Sammy" during their frequent joint appearances on conservative talk radio in Honolulu. 

Historically, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union has always prided itself on being among the most progressive labor unions.

For four decades, starting with its founding in 1937, the ILWU was led by radical Harry Bridges. Opposing FDR because the New Deal didn’t go far enough, Bridges was always skeptical of labor partnerships with mainstream politicians. He regarded the union as "incorruptible," and that spirit continues. Just this year, the ILWU left the AFL-CIO because the labor movement’s umbrella was deemed too close to the Obama Administration and excessively "moderate" on many key issues, including healthcare reform.

The ILWU has always been big on the West Coast and shortly after its founding extended its reach to the Territory of Hawai`i. In 1946, the ILWU organized a successful Territory-wide strike by sugar workers that stunned the "Big Five" corporations that had dominated Hawai`i’s economic and social structure for decades. The ILWU says the strike remains one of the union’s most successful organizing efforts, as reported on the ILWU Local 19 (Seattle) website:

The victory consolidated the ILWU in Hawaii: only union sugar would be moved from the plantations through the mills, over ILWU docks in the Islands and on the West Coast, and through ILWU-organized refineries on the mainland. And the militant, democratic traditions of the union helped end, once and for all, the employers' formerly successful division of the workers along lines of race, color, skill and even marital status.

In 1954, a labor-supported Democratic Party took over the Territory’s leadership from the Big Five-backed Republicans. Five years later, as the 50th state, Hawaii was known for its growing and powerful labor movement. The Aloha State today remains one of the most heavily unionized states, and the ILWU has 18,000 members in Hawai`i.

While the ILWU’s national leadership continues on an independent, progressive path, critics say the ILWU’s leadership in Hawai`i has proven to be anything but "incorruptible." ILWU Local 142 is known for its strangely cozy relationship with Alexander & Baldwin, Inc.-- despite that company’s Big Five legacy-- and other big businesses, along with an affinity for backing conservative politicians. Almost all viable political candidates in deep-blue Hawaii (Obama’s strongest state in both of his elections) are Democrats. But many of them are deeply conservative in ideology but run, opportunistically, with a D label. 24 of 25 State senators are Democrats, as are 44 of 51 State House Members. The four-member Congressional Delegation is all Democratic.

More recently, the local ILWU has been a steadfast backer of former Reagan White House and George W. Bush ultra-conservative appointee Mufi Hannemann. Despite his opposition to marriage equality and reproductive freedom, Hannemann received the ILWU’s endorsements in the Democratic primaries for Governor in 2010 and Congress in 2012. The ILWU has also been a vocal opponent of water and air-pollution policies supported by environmentalists. Though many ILWU members work in the tourism industry-- which is obviously dependent on Hawai`i’s beautiful natural environment-- the union’s leadership consistently adopts A&B’s positions on environmental issues that favor the ecologically dirty sugar industry.

News comes this week that the Hawai`i ILWU is now backing Congresswoman Colleen Hanabusa of the Wall Street-owned New Democrat Coalition in her bid to oust incumbent progressive Democratic Senator Brian Schatz.

If one only knew about the national ILWU, this endorsement would seem incongruous. For instance, New Dems like Hanabusa tend to be vocal supporters of "free trade" agreements, whereas the ILWU is skeptical of such agreements. Case in point, the ILWU was one of the most vociferous opponents of the Korea-United States Free Trade Agreement. Hanabusa joined with most House Republicans in voting for KORUS.

And Hanabusa has a spotty record on labor issues generally.

Though she touts her past career as a union attorney, she allegedly conspired with business and corrupt labor leaders to ensure that workers were not informed of their rights.

While in the state legislature, she steamrolled through "reforms" to labor laws that had been put in place by Hawaii’s early union leaders. Hanabusa was so emboldened by the support she received from the business community and the anti-labor local press, she considered a primary challenge against legendary progressive Congresswoman Patsy Mink.

But those with knowledge of the local ILWU are not surprised by the endorsement. Hanabusa’s proud thumbing of her nose at environmentalists and the Environmental Protection Agency on a clean-air vote is more important than her record on labor issues (and she openly acknowledges her vote-- her proudest, she says-- was at the behest of the ILWU/A&B partnership). Hanabusa’s campaign is led by A&B Chairman Walter Dods, and her Congressional office is reported adorned with A&B-related corporate insignias. An ILWU labor endorsement can be fairly read as an Alexander & Baldwin business endorsement.

Meanwhile, Schatz clearly enjoys most labor support in the race, including from the state’s largest union, the 50,000-member-strong Hawai`i Government Employees Association. So while the ILWU support is garnering Hanabusa a lot of media attention, it’s not reflective of union backing overall. And considering the ILWU’s dismal failures with Hannemann in the last two election cycles, it’s clear that the union’s support is anything but a guarantee of electoral success.

The HGEA's parent union, the national American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, also endorses Schatz. What about the proudly progressive national ILWU? Ask its leaders here. Blue America, of course, has proudly endorsed Schatz, based on a comparison of his progressive record and her conservative record (and long, sordid history of corruption). You can help Brian keep this seat progressive here at the Blue America ActBlue page.