Biden Has Been Pro-Union to the Hilt. Will His Predecessor Build on His Legacy — or Destroy It?
By Robert Fulton | contributing writer
Last September, at the height of the United Auto Workers’ multi-plant strike against the Big Three automakers, Joe Biden became the first sitting president in U.S. history to walk a union picket line.
For Larry Mazzola Jr., that said it all.
“That’s a president who really is behind unions,” said Mazzola, business manager of UA Plumbers and Pipefitters Local 38 and president of the San Francisco Building and Construction Trades Council.
Mazzola’s assessment might be something of an understatement when you consider the Biden-Harris administration’s track record in pro-labor policy, which has been a huge boon for American workers. But now, “Union Joe’s” legacy — and that of the labor movement altogether — could very well be in the crosshairs depending on the outcome of the presidential contest this November.
Biden Is Pro-Union ‘Without a Doubt,’ ‘Phenomenal’ for Trades
Not one for hyperbole, SF Building Trades Council Secretary-Treasurer Rudy Gonzalez heralded Biden as the most pro-labor president in a generation, “without a doubt.”
“I think people in my generation have a healthy dose of cynicism, having seen presidential administrations put corporate interests above working-class interests whether they have a D next to their name or an R,” said Gonzalez, who is 40.
“Both parties have hurt working people over the years,” he said. “One of them attacks us; another one falls short of our expectations.”
Gonzalez has a sound point about Biden’s legacy. Renowned University of Rhode Island labor historian Erik Loomis graded Biden with an A-minus — not too shabby coming from a professor by trade. The Biden-Harris administration has been responsible for several policies and pieces of legislation that have provided tens of thousands of jobs and lifted up working families, both union and non-union.
Some of these include the passage of the $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act; enactment of the Inflation Reduction Act; an executive order for the use of project labor agreements on federal construction projects; investment in clean energy jobs; and support for the right to organize.
With multiple construction projects that receive federal funding currently underway in the Bay Area, the building trades workers of the region are benefiting directly from Biden’s PLA order, including those at work on the Salesforce Transit Center and biosolids digester facility.
“President Biden is phenomenal,” said California State Building and Construction Trades Council President Chris Hannan. “The policies that he not only supported but was able to pass and implement are such a difference-maker for union membership in the building and construction trades and for American workers as a whole.”
Hannan credited Biden’s signing of the Chips and Science Act with bringing semiconductor manufacturing back to the United States. Hannan’s uncle, a member of UA Plumbers and Pipefitters Local 364, is currently working on a travel card at a semiconductor plant in Arizona.
“There is no possible way that we would be building a semiconductor plant in Arizona with union labor if it wasn’t for the policies of this administration,” Hannan said.
Gonzalez predicted that the impact of the Biden-Harris administration’s massive investments in job and infrastructure to labor will benefit the building trades for many years to come.
“We’ve only just begun to see the positive impacts of so much of that investment,” he said. “Without a doubt, it will outlast my career in the building trades in terms of the number of workers and the hours of work that our members will directly benefit from right here in San Francisco.”
Gonzalez added that he sees that long-term commitment to labor as being fully ingrained in the Biden-Harris administration.
For Mazzola, Biden’s authenticity in supporting labor has been refreshing, providing a stark contrast to countless past administrations that pandered for union votes while lacking the bravery to publicly stand for organized labor.
“It seems like presidents in the past have been cautious to say the word ‘union’ a lot, and President Biden would say ‘union’ in every speech, and he wasn’t afraid to do it,” Mazzola said. “He made it okay to say that unions are good.”
A Clear and Present Danger
One benefit of facing a presidential candidate who has already served in the Oval Office is that one doesn’t need much conjecture to determine his policies — there’s a clear track record left as evidence. And former president Donald Trump’s track record on labor couldn’t be clearer.
“I don’t think we have to guess,” Gonzalez said. “I think President Trump showed us exactly what kind of president he would be for workers. I think his is the plan of chaos and disruption, and in a way that is devoid of facts.”
During his time in office, Trump worked to undermine OSHA and the National Labor Relations Board, oversaw a government shutdown, made promises about an infrastructure package he didn’t keep, promoted judges hostile to labor, and provided a massive tax cut for the nation’s wealthy.
If there’s any indication provided by Project 2025 — ultraconservative think tank the Heritage Foundation’s blueprint for overhauling the executive branch — a second Trump term would be even worse than the last. During his presidency, Trump implemented nearly two-thirds of the Heritage Foundation’s 2016 policy blueprint.
Here are just a handful of targets on the Project 2025 hit list: federal employees (replace them with loyalist political appointees), the Federal Trade Commission (abolish it), the NLRB (gut it), the Inflation Reduction Act (repeal it), and the Infrastructure and Jobs Act (severely curtail it).
Mazzola put it succinctly, saying, “A Trump presidency is going to be worse than the first one.”
What About Madame President?
Hannan also expressed no doubts about the negative effects another Trump presidency would likely have on both labor and the country at large, but he soon shifted the discussion to what makes Vice-President Kamala Harris such a prime successor to Biden and strong candidate against Trump.
“We need to focus on the positive and get a president who believes in American workers, who believes in the United States, who is proud to move policy that benefits union membership and all the rights and benefits that we get under collective bargaining,” Hannan said.
Harris is certainly a known quantity to the building trades in San Francisco. She’s long enjoyed labor’s support, from her rise as SF District Attorney and California Attorney General to U.S. Senator and Vice-President.
“She is, in many ways, the Kamala Harris we have always known,” Gonzalez said. “She is strategic, she is smart, she is loyal, and I have no reason to doubt that her administration will be as pro-labor and responsive to the needs of working people as President Biden has been.”
‘Easiest Pick You’ll Ever Have’
Not all unions march in lockstep with one political party or the other, and the building trades are no exception. Gonzalez acknowledged the diversity of thought within the trades but expressed his feeling that the November choice should be a clear one for all working people.
“I am confident that blue-collar building trades members will see one candidate who has already helped deliver those jobs and will continue to do so, and another candidate who was nothing but broken promises and lies,” he said. “If I know building trades members, they are people who value honesty, patriotism, and people who will help put them to work, and that’s why I think our members are going to turn out overwhelmingly for Harris and [Harris VP pick, Minnesota Governor] Tim Walz.”
Mazzola also appealed to building trades members who might be leaning right.
“If you only go off the records of what you know Trump has done for the building trades and labor versus what Biden-Harris has done, it’s just a slam dunk,” he said of the Harris choice. “It’s the easiest pick you’ll ever have.
“If you just go off of who’s better for labor, it’s just no comparison.”
