Elizabeth Warren allows 2020 campaign staff to unionize
Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s presidential campaign staff has moved to unionize ahead of the 2020 election, according to the business manager of the union breach that will represent the workers.
Steven Soule of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 2320 confirmed to FOX Business that presidential campaign staffers reached out to the union a couple of months ago looking to become part of the local.
“We notified the Warren campaign on Monday, and now we move to the bargaining table,” Soule said.
Warren, D-Mass. is the third Democratic presidential candidate to allow workers to unionize. In mid-March, workers on the Democratic campaign of Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., unionized, becoming the first presidential campaign staffers in history to do so. Sanders, an outspoken consumer advocate, immediately recognized his campaign staff’s union and said he was proud of the distinction.
Then, at the beginning of May, Julián Castro, former secretary of Housing and Urban Development under President Barack Obama, followed up on an earlier pledge and endorsed his campaign staff’s choice to join a union.
Because New Hampshire is the first state to hold a presidential primary, Soule said the unions in the state have a “long-standing relationship” with campaign workers.
“We tend to attract some of the best talent from across the country here,” he said. “They typically get here and they’re looking for a place to set up shop and set up work.”
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX BUSINESS APP
Former Vice President Joe Biden -- who has described himself as a “union man, period” on the campaign trail -- has also said that he would allow his presidential campaign staff to unionize if they wanted to do so, but that he’d offer a competitive wage so that it was unnecessary.