Get Out the Vote 2024: Members Hit Pavement, Phones to Fight for Pro-IBEW, Pro-Worker Future
Hundreds of IBEW members, union allies and volunteers from Pennsylvania and beyond have been gathering this fall at York, Pa., Local 229 for weekend canvasses in support of the Harris/Walz ticket and pro-worker candidates up and down the state ballot. Volunteers were in for a surprise Saturday, Oct. 26, when Kamala Harris’ husband Doug Emhoff, pictured just left of center, dropped by the hall to thank them and Local 229. “It’s really uplifting to see this many people focused on elected people who won’t just be good for the IBEW but for all workers and working families,” Business Manager Tom Henchey said.
Canvassing, phone banks and rallies have kept Detroit Local 58 members especially busy in their swing state, where Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate, Tim Walz, have made multiple stops, along with visits from former President Barack Obama and other major political figures. But the local is fighting just as hard for pro-worker township candidates, Michigan Supreme Court justices, members of Congress and U.S. Senate candidate Elissa Slotkin. Above, IBEW members turned out in force for a canvass hosted at Local 58’s hall Oct. 12.
Janesville, Wis., Local 890 used their grounds on a gorgeous fall day Saturday, Oct. 26, to host one of Sen. Tammy Baldwin’s stops in her re-election campaign, kicking off a day of phone-banking and canvassing for Baldwin, the Harris-Walz ticket and other pro-worker candidates. In addition to Local 890 activists, IBEW volunteers included members from Madison Local 159, Milwaukee Local 494 and an out-of-state contingent from Chicago Local 134. Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers also spoke, as did Sixth District International Vice President Mike Clemmons. “We used our front lawn area because there were too many people for our hall,” Local 890 Business Manager Ben Myers said. “It was a good turnout, and we did a lot of canvassing afterwards. We’re also canvassing locally each day.”
IBEW locals and union allies in Ohio are fighting hard to return pro-worker champion Sherrod Brown to the U.S. Senate in a race against a fiercely anti-union businessman. Top left, pictured with Sen. Brown on Saturday, Oct. 26, members from Ohio locals that include Cleveland Local 38, Steubenville Local 246, Canton Local 540, Toledo Local 8 and Lorain Local 129 get ready to knock doors in Cleveland. Above right, an IBEW group en route to Cleveland includes business managers John Novak from Local 129, Dan Gallagher from Local 38 and Kevan Brown from Local 246, along with Fourth District International Vice President Gina Cooper, center. Bottom left, Kevan Brown speaks to news media on Thursday, Oct. 24, saying, “The choice for Senate in Ohio couldn’t be more clear. Sherrod Brown is a guy who stood by workers like us every step of the way.”
Macon, Ga., Local 1316 has been in the thick of get-out-the-vote efforts, leading and hosting canvasses and phone banks as often as six days a week in October, as well as press conferences. Those include a media event on the first day of early voting in Georgia, where Business Manager Stacey Mixson, center, warned of the dangers that the Republican-backed Project 2025 poses to unions, jobs and workers’ financial security. Mixson told The Electrical Worker that “The IBEW’s been killing it” in central Georgia. “We’ve got a pretty good little ground game going,” he said. “Nobody’s sitting on their hands around here.”
IBEW locals in New Jersey regularly host six of the state AFL-CIO’s 12 weekend labor walks, which have drawn 900 or more union activists each Saturday, more than a fifth of them IBEW members. Nearly 1,100 walkers turned out on Oct. 26, including the group pictured above outside Clifton, N.J., Local 1158. While many of New Jersey’s state and local elections are held in odd-numbered years, union members are working hard to elect pro-worker candidates to Congress, including re-electing IBEW member and long-serving U.S. House Rep. Donald Norcross and sending Rep. Andy Kim to the U.S. Senate.
Saint Paul, Minn., Local 110 members turned out in force for an October phone bank at the city’s labor federation offices, where they called union homes statewide to support pro-worker candidates on the Nov. 5 ballot. President Logan Beere said, “Every time our Local 110 members volunteer, it’s a powerful reminder that elections matter across all generations of the IBEW. From retirees to apprentices, when our members stand together to support labor-endorsed candidates, they’re showing just how important it is to protect the rights and future of every worker.” One of their major goals this year is re-electing U.S. Rep. Angie Craig, who the Southeastern Minnesota Building & Construction Trades said, “understands the importance of investing in infrastructure and transportation that provide the economic stability for our communities.”
Detroit Local 58 members hit the streets to knock at union homes in support of pro-worker candidates up and down the ballot, including races that will determine whether the Michigan Supreme Court maintains a worker-friendly majority.
Fifty to 60 members of high-energy Boston Local 103 have been making trips every Saturday this fall to neighboring New Hampshire to knock doors for Joyce Craig for governor and other pro-worker candidates. Business Manager Lou Antonellis said volunteers are eager to help their New Hampshire brothers and sisters, who include more than 800 Local 103 members living just over the Massachusetts border. They’re also freer to help this year, with their own state’s full slate of House Democrats running unopposed and Sen. Elizabeth Warren leading by a wide margin. “It’s important to our members to be active,” he said. “They care about what happens, and it’s a pretty safe bet how the election is going to go in Boston.”
Members of San Diego Local 569 are going all out for pro-IBEW local candidates, “our labor champions,” in their hometown and surrounding counties, while also pushing hard for San Diego Measure G, a half-cent sales tax for regional transportation and infrastructure projects. The local revved into high gear in October with building trades’ labor walks on Saturdays and some Sundays to ensure that “funding exists for our current and future work through Measure G and [to support] elected officials who will fight to provide more opportunities to IBEW 569 members to uplift our families and communities.”
A core group of York, Pa., Local 229 activists in the prep area for the huge weekend canvasses they have hosted at their hall and training center this fall to elect pro-worker candidates at every level of government. In addition to IBEW and other area union volunteers, Business Manager Tom Henchey said seven charter buses arrived for the latest day of action Oct. 26.
At left, a Local 890 family listens to speakers during a campaign stop for U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin on the local’s grounds in Janesville, 40 miles south of Madison, on Saturday, Oct. 26. At right, Sixth District International Vice President Mike Clemmons, with Baldwin to his right, champions Wisconsin’s pro-worker candidates and rallies IBEW members and other volunteers for a day of get-out-the-vote canvassing and phone calls.
East Windsor, N.J., Local 827, which has offices statewide, always plays a major role in get-out-the-vote activities for the area’s labor movement. Pat Glover a chief steward pictured front left, is especially tireless, said Local 827 Business Agent Tom Kelly, president of the Passaic County Central Labor Council. “Pat does all of the logistical stuff for our walks including making all the packets on Friday nights then getting there at 6 a.m. on Saturdays. He arranges the speakers and makes sure we walk their turf that day. Last year, he battled throat cancer and never missed a week,” Kelly said. In addition to Glover and other CLC members, Kelly is pictured at left in back, next to Local 827 Business Manager Bob Speer and, at right, Mark Battagliese, Paterson, N.J., Local 102 business agent and financial secretary
At the iconic H&H soul-food diner in Macon, Ga., Gov. Tim Walz visits with Macon Local 1316 Business Manager Stacey Mixson, front right, and other labor leaders on the Central Georgia CLC. The informal, free-flowing conversation included a lot of union talk, Mixon said. “We discussed his days as a union teacher, and we talked a little smack of which union is the best between us at the table and who has the best swag,” he said. “He was the nicest, most down-to-earth politician I’ve probably ever met.”
From city halls and state legislatures to Congress and the White House, IBEW activists are making a final push this week to urge their brothers and sisters to vote for candidates who will always put workers first — and to do it now.
Early in-person voting is available virtually everywhere in the United States, along with same-day registration in 23 states and the District of Columbia. The last day to vote is Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 5.
Check your registration status and details about locations and hours for early voting and Election Day precincts using online tools such as Vote.org.
“Don’t take any chances when it comes to casting your ballot. You never know what might come up if you wait,” International President Kenneth W. Cooper said. “Everything we’ve gained and everything we’re still fighting for is on the line.
“That’s true whether we’re talking about electing a town council that supports prevailing wage, legislators who will block union-busting right-to-work laws, or a president who cast the tie-breaking vote in Congress to save our pensions and has proven again and again to be our champion,” Cooper said, referring to Vice President Kamala Harris.
As IBEW members knock on doors, make phone calls and visit worksites, they are stressing the importance of races up and down the ballot — ensuring that smaller races don’t get lost amid the enormous energy that is critical to winning the White House and worker-friendly majorities in Congress.
IBEW locals are putting lots of energy into critical city and county races around the country, working to elect worker-friendly candidates who support building trades issues such as prevailing wage and project labor agreements. In Minnesota, pictured above, Saint Paul Local 110 campaigns for former state legislator Mark Wiens in his bid to be a commissioner in suburban Washington County.
“Some days we have so many people here, and you can’t be at everything,” said Detroit Local 58 registrar and Recording Secretary Jeannette Bradshaw, citing the many visits to swing-state Michigan by Harris; her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz; and the many political VIPs campaigning for them.
“We know how important it is all the way down the ballot,” Bradshaw said. “It really is about having the right school board and the right county officials and township supervisor and retaining the elected officials who have proven they support us, the building trades and Michigan’s working families.”
In York, Pa., Local 229 has been hosting busloads of weekend canvassers at its hall and training center, in addition to its own members and other IBEW brothers and sisters hitting the streets.
“We were approached by the Harris-Walz campaign and the Pennsylvania Democrats,” Business Manager Tom Henchey said. “The first weekend, we had 492 people from all over the place, and it’s kept growing from there.”
It’s not only the campaigns that benefit. Noting a thank-you email he received from a woman who arrived on a charter bus, Henchey said it’s also good public relations for the IBEW and its apprenticeship programs.
“She said how welcome they felt here and what a good impression we made,” he said. “A lot of people don’t know anything about unions, so we’re happy to have any opportunity to bring people in and show them what we do.”
IBEW and union allies across Ohio are fighting hard to reelect Sen. Sherrod Brown, one of the strongest pro-union, pro-worker members of Congress in modern history. Despite that, he is in the fight of his political life against a billionaire-backed car dealer so hostile to workers’ rights that he’s been sued by employees for wage theft.
That’s one of the messages Kevan Brown, business manager of Steubenville, Ohio, Local 246, drives home when he talks about the race. He says the choice couldn’t be clearer, stressing the unwavering leadership of Sen. Brown — no relation — on jobs, pensions and other issues vital to working people.
“He’s a guy who’s stood by workers like us every step of the way, every single day,” Brown said a news conference Oct. 24. “Because of Sherrod Brown, we’re seeing real progress. We’re seeing waterlines, sewer systems and bridges like the Market Street Bridge being rebuilt by Ohio workers with American-made products.”
IBEW members head toward the Ellipse on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., for Kamala Harris’ speech Oct. 29, where she cited her “To Do” list — a policy agenda that includes tax cuts for working Americans and other major economic relief for home buyers, health care, elder care and more, such as investments in building trades apprenticeships and pre-apprenticeships. A strong proponent of union training programs, Harris has toured numerous JATCs around the country and has said repeatedly that she’s “on a mission to visit every IBEW local.”
From municipal to state levels, ballot measures are a key part of many IBEW campaigns across the country. Ohio unions are part of a broad coalition of supporters fighting to end partisan gerrymandering in their state, known as the “Yes on Issue 1” campaign. In San Diego, Local 569 and its allies are also pushing hard for Measure G, a half-cent sales tax for regional transportation and infrastructure projects.
While traditional phone banks and door-to-door canvassing at union homes remain a critical part of labor’s get-out-the-vote campaigns, a newer method is reaching hundreds of thousands of members at lightning speed: peer-to-peer texting, an effort that has proven effective in campaigns over the past couple of years.
East Windsor, N.J., Local 827 members have been among 15 to 20 volunteers helping the state AFL-CIO send texts three days a week to build support and turn out voters for labor-endorsed candidates.
Volunteers have sent nearly 1 million messages over the past few weeks, said Tom Kelly, Local 827 business agent and president of the Passaic County Central Labor Council, explaining that it starts with a Zoom call with instructions and encouragement from federation leaders.
“Once you’re ready to send texts, there’s a pre-loaded message and you’re loaded with 300 union members’ numbers,” Kelly said. “As fast as you can hit enter or the space bar you can send a text. After you complete your 300, if anyone responds, you respond with any of 6 preloaded answers and then get another 300. I’ve sent over 8,000 in an hour, and others have sent over 10,000.”
Cooper thanked the thousands of IBEW volunteers across the country, while asking all members and their families to do their part between now and Election Day.
“We couldn’t be prouder or more appreciative of everyone who has put in the legwork, hours on the phones or taken part in any of the countless activities this fall to elect people who will put workers first,” he said. “But we also understand that not everyone has the time to be directly involved.
“But there is one thing we all can do and must do: Get to the polls, whether early voting or your precinct on Election Day, and make your voice heard.”
CLICK HERE for a gallery of IBEW get-out-the-vote photos from around the country.
