Unions have been yowling about the Citizens United decision since the election of Scott Walker was attributed by Democrats to pro-business Super Pacs and big donor bundlers like the Koch brothers. What rarely gets mentioned is the power the controversial decision gave to labor unions that they will only first fully exploit this election year. Citizens United gave unions the power to spend union resources attempting to politically influence the general public. Before Citizens United, unions could only campaign for or against a political candidate to their own members. The decision removes that restriction granting unions the same freedom of political speech the new law grants to corporations. And it appears labor intends to take full advantage of the gift; the AFL-CIO has announced it expects its member unions to put 400,000 members on the ground this year (a force about the size of the U.S. Army) to knock doors for Obama and other Democrats. That figure would not include the ground forces of the Change to Win labor federation that includes SEIU, the Teamsters and the UFCW. The SEIU alone has announced it intends to mobilize 100,000 members this cycle. Some labor experts estimate unions will drop well over the $400M they spent on Obama in 2008, with most money this year going to troops on ground, the most effective way to influence an election. Not only did the decision grant unions more room to flex their organizing muscles, it gave unions exponentially bigger bang for their dues buck. Before Citizens United, union sponsored door knockers, limited as they were to only visiting union households, would skip from street to street, losing hours in a day to drive time and looking for addresses. And union door knockers were also only able to make a difference in areas with significant union density to tap. Now those same union ground forces will be able to knock every door, going door to door, anywhere they are needed, or target Democrats, independents, the elderly or new voters, now talking to several households in the same time it once took to just find the next union member’s house. That hasn’t stopped unions from continuing to posture around the repeal of Citizens United; just last week the member unions of the AFL-CIO issued a joint resolution calling for a constitutional amendment to overturn the ruling. However unions are now quick to mention that as a Constitutional amendment is such a serious step, the language for it must be written “like a laser” to really hone in on the specifics of a problem. And according to the AFL-CIO, “amending the U.S. Constitution should be a rare act, done with the greatest of care,” and “narrowly crafted to protect our democracy from the economic power of the 1 percent.” And there you go. It’s also no shock that unions are now pushing the difference between the evil of corporate political spending and those benchmarks of true democracy — union political programs. “Any campaign finance reform,” the labor federation said, “needs to recognize the fundamental distinction between the democratically governed communications among working people through unions and the unaccountable spending by corporations and the rich.” Meanwhile, top union officials worry privately that their members might not be as motivated to reelect Obama as they are. “Fully mobilized, they can be a major factor,” said Steve Rosenthal, a Democratic strategist and former political director of the AFL-CIO. “Are the rank-and-file leaders going to be jazzed; are they going to do the work of talking to members? That’s what makes the difference.”
