NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS | June 3, 2016 | PAGE 3
To stay afloat, Working Families Party needs more voters by August
The labor-backed political party
gave up its own members to
help Bernie Sanders’ revolution.
The Oregon Working Families
Party was so committed to
Bernie Sanders that its staff
called and emailed the party’s
own members asking them to
re-register as Democrats — so
they could vote for him in the
May 17 primary. Sanders won
Oregon, 56 to 44 percent. Now
the union-backed minor party
needs those former members to
return.
Under Oregon law, minor
parties can maintain their ballot
status (the right to run candi-
dates in the general election) in
two ways. They can show that at
least half a percent of the elec-
torate is registered as members.
Or they can field a candidate
who wins at least 1 percent of
the vote in a statewide election.
Oregon Working Families Party
hasn’t run a statewide candidate
in the last two general election
cycles, so if it wants to be on the
ballot this November, it has to
have at least 10,825 registered
voters by Aug. 10.
The party had well more than
that before Sanders came along.
From January to September
2015, its membership grew
from about 9,000 to 11,817,
thanks to a paid canvass. But by
the May 2016 primary, it had
dropped to fewer than 9,600
registered voters.
Now the party is scrambling
to re-recruit its lapsed members,
and reaching out to unaffiliated
voters who became Democrats
for Bernie. It helps that Oregon
makes it easy to change party
registration: Voters can do so
online at bit.ly/1xB8oEc .
The party is holding caucus
meetings, and will decide at a
July 23 meeting who to endorse
and whether to run its own can-
didates in the November elec-
tion. Shanti Lewallen — a union
Longshore worker who earned a
law degree — is campaigning to
be an Oregon Working Families
Party candidate to challenge
Democratic U.S. Sen. Ron
Wyden. But the party’s ability to
endorse or run its own candi-
dates in the general election de-
pends on whether it can get to
10,825.
OREGON WORKING FAMILIES PARTY: WHAT IS IT?
Oregon Working Families Party is the little party that could. Though it has never elected a
candidate on its own ballot line in Oregon, it has endorsed and helped to elect major party
candidates who commit to its working families agenda, and it was a big part of the coali-
tion that passed the state paid sick leave law. It’s backed by a number of labor organizations,
including UFCW Local 555, Operating Engineers Local 701, Teamsters Local 206, CWA Local
7901, ILWU, Laborers Local 483, IBEW Local 48, and UNITE HERE Local 8. It’s also part of a
national organization with active chapters in New York and other states.
Burgerville to meet with union
At its May 23 meeting, North-
west Oregon Labor Council
(NOLC) — the local council of
AFL-CIO-affiliated unions —
endorsed the Burgerville Work-
ers Union, which launched April
26. Delegates passed a resolution
pledging to support their strug-
gle, and encouraging affiliated
unions and members to do so
too. Most workers earn at or near
the minimum wage at Burg-
erville, a regional fast food chain
with about 40 stores. Burgerville
Workers Union—affiliated with
the Industrial Workers of the
World—is calling for a $5 an
hour raise; quality, affordable
health care; paid parental leave;
and childcare and transportation
stipends. The union hasn’t re-
quested government certifica-
tion, but no law prevents the
company from meeting with the
union if it chooses to.
At a Vancouver TED Talks-
style event May 26, CEO Jeff
Harvey had just finished speak-
ing about Burgerville’s mission
of serving good food “with
love” when a group of Burg-
erville workers approached and
asked if he’d meet with them.
Harvey said he couldn’t meet
with them as a group, but would
be willing to meet singly. Asked
by the Labor Press to confirm
that, Burgerville emailed a state-
ment saying employees may ex-
press individual viewpoints to
appropriate personnel, but Burg-
erville won’t meet for collective
bargaining with any employee
or group of employees until a
showing of majority support for
a union in a National Labor Re-
lations Board (NLRB)-super-
vised election. Burgerville
worker Jordan Vaandering says
the union will take Harvey up
on the individual meeting.
A delegation of students from
Portland State, Reed College,
Lewis and Clark College, and
Cleveland High School visited
Burgerville headquarters May
23 to deliver signatures of sup-
port for the union effort from
over 500 students and faculty.
And at press time, union sup-
porters await final resolution of
a discipline case. Ivy Fleak, an
outspokenly pro-union worker
at the Vancouver Plaza Burg-
erville, was suspended for what
supporters say were trumped-up
violations. In a charge filed May
23 with the NLRB, the union
says the discipline was illegal
retaliation.
At Bernie Sanders’ primary election night party in Portland, Oregon Working
Families Party field manager Ian Johnson — a member of CWA Local 7901
— staffs the beer station. Johnson was one of three Oregon Working Families
Party staff devoted full-time to the Sanders’ campaign in the months leading
up to the May 17 vote.