AFL-CIO PRESIDENT TRUMKA SPEECH to STUDENT ACTIVISTS
Most of you probably don’t know much about unions. I hope you know that unions are nothing but working women and men who’ve come together for the strength to improve our lives – at work and in our economy. Some of you probably think we’re a bunch of stodgy, old-school people with outdated ideas – too interested in what’s good for us and too disinterested in what’s good for others in our communities -- and to be perfectly frank with you, there’s a grain of truth to that – and it’s something we’re working to change. But at the end of the day, our goal is and has always been simple and pure—we want to make life better for working people.
We’re not always spiffy and clean. Some of us are a little rough around the edges. But the labor movement and progressive student activists share the same core values.
And let me say this -- As the next generation of activists and leaders, you are also part of the next generation of workers, and the way you exercise your activism and solidarity on the job will define the future of work.
You see, activism isn’t limited to what we do off-hours or as career advocates. It’s also what we do every day where we work. As progressive activists we have to understand that “workers’ rights” are civil rights, to turn lousy jobs into good jobs -- even if we have to fight for it—and for that matter, to work together with employers who want to do the right things for working families and solve problems to create a sustainable future.
Your generation’s struggle for jobs—for quality jobs—with fair wages and good benefits, so that those of you who have student debt can have the ability to pay it down and have the opportunity to live the life you want: the ability to get married, to raise a family if you want to, to start a business, to fight for the causes you believe in, and to leave a stronger America for the generations that follow you -- that struggle is the struggle of the labor movement, and that struggle is also my struggle.
You see, activists from my generation and before me also needed solidarity on and off the job to improve this country. The struggles of working people haven’t changed all that much, and that’s why we share so many values in common.
Unions have been fighting for social and economic justice since our beginnings.
We’ve worked for decades, and will continue to fight, to make sure no employer can
pay you less just because you are a woman, or person of color.
We’ve supported benefits for same-sex couples since the early 1990s.
We fight today for the passage of the DREAM Act and comprehensive immigration reform.
We stood with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and the activists of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. We supported Occupy Wall St. We’re working to address the issue of college debt, and we’ll stand with the activists and the movements of tomorrow.
And, my friends, we will stand with you through it all.
Today, America is in crisis. We’re at a tipping point. Wall Street and corporate CEOs have pretty well figured out how to make mountainous profits off the backs of America’s workers, especially young workers. Big money has locked Washington in stalemate. Things can’t continue in this vein for very long.
But I might surprise you by saying that this isn’t all bad news. The good news is that we’re going to change it – I’ve never seen more determination to change it. America is in the process of rediscovering collective power to make things better for all of us, politically, socially, and economically.
My story in how I got involved within this movement is probably similar to yours. I can remember when I blew out my knee in college and lost my football scholarship. Unable to afford to go to college, I went home and got a job in a coal mine. I had to figure out how to finish my degree while working full time in some of the most dangerous work conditions imaginable. About that time I got involved in a movement in my union called Miners for Democracy.
Miners for Democracy wanted to return our union to its activist roots so it would answer not to our employers, but to our members—so we could use our union to improve ourselves. People said it couldn’t be done, but we didn’t know any better. I thought hard about what to do next, and I talked to a lot of people. I’m lucky that my father always had a head and the heart for doing the right thing. I’m lucky my mother gave me my passion and my fire.
It took years. I ended up getting my law degree, with the support of my union. It took the Miners for Democracy years of activism, risk and perseverance, but we came out on top, and that’s the shortest possible version of how I became the youngest president in the history of the United Mine Workers of America.
It would be a gross understatement to say that not everybody was supportive along the way. I think a lot of people thought I was out of my mind, or just a dreamer.
But it didn’t stop me. It still doesn’t. I’m lucky that I’ve been able to spend my entire professional life in the service of working people, of union members. And we’re still working to make sure that our labor movement struggles to help working people every way we can—first, last and always.
We try to keep our eye on a simple vision. I believe that every single working person in America who works hard and plays by the rules should have a fair shot at a decent life—the opportunity to be who they want to be and earn good pay and benefits and a secure retirement. And I believe that this ideal is not a cost to be weighed against national prosperity, but that the two are one and the same.
Here’s the most amazing thing. Our goals are much closer than most people realize. Wall Street hasn’t learned its lesson -- of course not. And sometimes it seems like some people just wish we could return to the upside of a bubble economy.
But something is happening in America.
Just a few short years ago, the DREAM Act was nowhere. Now, because the DREAMers refused to take no for an answer, it has momentum and national support from the President of the United States.
Not even a decade ago, marriage equality was considered far-fetched. It was used as a tool of the right wing. Now it, too, has the endorsement of the President of the United States, and a majority of Americans.
Collective bargaining? It dropped out of the public consciousness years and years ago -- but today, support for the rights of workers is back.
In the experience of a young person, some of these struggles may seem long, but I can look back and see that they weren’t long at all, not when measured against the history of the struggle for justice. Not when measured against the sea change they represent.
There is no end to what Campus Progress can do. You don’t sit around talking about problems. You generate ideas, and you get things done.
Look at how lucky we are! I wouldn’t want to be a leader of the American labor movement at any other time. And you? You are strong activists with your entire careers in front of you.
This is the moment that counts. You couldn’t script a better time. It is time for us to act. And I know that you will.
I want to thank each and every one of you, and I wish for all of you a future of hope and dedication -- and one that is forever young. Thank you
by Jackie Tortora
