Fight Club isthe, call to action’ segment within Grit Northwest.
It’s built to educate and motivate you to fight back against attacks on your right’s as a Union Carpenter to provide for yourself and your family.
Fight Club is not for excuse makers or finger pointers.
If standing proud, with your brothers and sisters to protect what we have worked so hard to achieve is not your cup of tea, you can stop listening now.
Fight Club members care about their careers and aren’t afraid to take action to protect it. They don’t assume or expect someone else to do the heavy lifting needed to strengthen their union and better their lives.
Fight Club members roll up their sleeves and get involved, because they understand and appreciate that a union is only as strong as its members.
My question for you is, are you ready to join Fight Club?
If so, let’s get to work.
Our guest today is Matt Swanson Political Director of the NW Carpenters Union.
The threat of complacency in this coming election has been identified. Complacency at the polls can have real consequence in our ability to provide for ourselves and our families.
Vote in this coming election and support those candidates who have your back.
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It will help others find the show.
Thank you for your support. Until next time remember to
Work safe, work smart and Stay Union Strong!!!
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Joe Cadwell:
Welcome to the show, Matt.
Matt Swanson:
Hey, Joe, glad to be here.
Joe Cadwell:
Great to have you back. So Matt, the focus of Fight Club, as you know is to identify a threat to our organization and to our members, livelihoods. Our members are being called into action. So Matt, what is the threat? And how do we fight it?
Matt Swanson:
Sure, Joe. So I really think of it as you know, it's both a fight we're engaged in, and a really opportunity for us to build a more hopeful future for workers in the construction industry, we have just 14 days, two weeks until Election Day. And really what's on the ballot for us is the future of collective bargaining. What is the strength of collective bargaining in our state's our elected officials going to be repelling and defeating attempts to pass so called Right to Work laws? Are they going to stand up for union workers and non union workers who want to form a union and make laws stronger that protect folks when they want to stand up for the rights? Are they going to defend our unit apprenticeships, from attempts to weaken standards like we've seen from the current administration? And are they going to do things that are going to promote and defend our health plans and pensions and prevailing wages on our jobs? that's really what's on the ballot. And that's what we're looking for from candidates and from issues that we see before us when you go to cast your ballot in the next 14 days. I know many members are out there. They got a ballot in hand already. If they haven't turned it in, they're probably looking at ads looking at the Council website, Northwest carpenters.org slash live ballot to get information on what candidates we recommend that they consider when they go to cast their vote. And that's the fight in front of us, Joe.
Joe Cadwell:
That sounds great. Matt, as we talked about last time, you're on the show. The race for president is in our primary concern within our six state Regional Council. What would you say the key battle states are the key battle issues are?
Matt Swanson:
Sure, Joe, that's a great question. And you know, we know that the presidential races on a lot of folks mine really seems to be trending in the favor of former Vice President Joe Biden right now but looking at some of the key races here in the Pacific Northwest. I think we talked about the state of Montana last time I was on and that's still really too close to call. Longtime union supporter Steve Bullock current governor Montana is in a toss up race against senator Steve Daines. And all the polling, all of the information we see coming in says that this is going to be probably with the tightest race in the country. And it really could decide control the Senate, are we going to have a pro worker majority or a majority that doesn't do as much to pass infrastructure funding, that's going to pass laws that could impact our ability to collective bargaining negatively or positively. So that race is really close and that we of course, have a really tight governor's race there between Mike Cooney and Greg Jian forte. We've endorsed Mike Cooney. He's a longtime union supporter, watch picket lines with folks throughout the state is never shied away from a fight on the side of workers. That race is also too close to call. So, you know, today across the council, we've actually called or knocked on the doors of over 23,000, folks. And that is more than twice what we did during the last election cycle. We've got members really from all corners of our council active and engaged in this political season. And that Montana race, I think is a big one. We also know that there's a couple of legislator legislators that are up and we see Oregon Alaska and Washington having some pretty tight races that will determine a lot about the future of those states, as well as a couple of congressional seats in Oregon Pieter de Fazio is in a really close race in the fourth district. He's been a long long time champion for the carpenters on issues from natural resources and timber to how we protect workers in trade deals. And finally, the race in the third congressional district in Southwest Washington where Jamie Herrera Butler who's voted five times to repeal federal prevailing wage is up against a union supporter and Carolyn long. So those are some of the ones that I'm watching that I think when we go to sleep on election night could be pretty close and we're hoping to have some favorable results Joe
Joe Cadwell:
Thanks for that, Matt. And because this is Fight Club, and our listeners want to be involved at this point, what can we ask of our listeners? How can they help out?
Matt Swanson:
So the easiest thing you can do is first of all, go to nw carpenters.org slash live, dash ballot. And I got to correct that I said it wrong earlier, nw carpenters.org slash live dash ballot, I assume we'll put that link up in the show notes. But that's the first thing is get educated and understand what some of the recommendations coming from your local political committees are. The next thing is get in touch with your local political leads and local union to sign up for some get out the vote, communications with other union households throughout your area. That's going to be critical towards the end here as we try to educate folks and encourage some of those people are pretty busy right now to take the time to turn in their ballot receipts and record high turnout across our council. And we want to be part of that this is a big election, we got lots of folks participating. And you know, the final thing is, just make sure you're talking to your friends and family, talking to people on your worksite making sure they're casting their ballot, that they're an informed voter and taking care to look at some of those resources that are available to them through the council or even you're looking in their local newspapers. I think there's a lot of information out there that can make people feel confident about their votes. And we're always here to help talk about what issues matter to Union carpenters. So that's our role in this election. That's our interest. And I think there's a lot of ways that they can be involved over the next 14 days.
Joe Cadwell:
That's great, man. I'll make sure to add all that contact information on to the show notes. Again, it's always a pleasure to have you on the show. Thank you so much for taking your time to be here. I know you're a busy guy. But thank you so much.
Matt Swanson:
All right. Thank you, Joe. And now let's make sure that we get out and vote and have a winning result on November 3.
