GREENS URGE NATIONAL SUPPORT FOR DOCKWORKERS IN STANDOFF

THE GREEN PARTY OF THE UNITED STATES

MEDIA RELEASE
For immediate release:
Wednesday, October 9, 2002

Contacts:
Nancy Allen, Media Coordinator, 207-326-4576,
nallen [at] acadia.net
Scott McLarty, Media Coordinator, 202-518-5624,
scottmclarty [at] yahoo.com


GREENS URGE NATIONAL SUPPORT FOR DOCKWORKERS IN STANDOFF

"Blame union-busting Wal-Mart, Gap, Chiquita,
etc., not the ILWU, for holding the economy
hostage," say Greens


WASHINGTON, DC -- Green candidates and activists
called for national support for locked out
workers of the International Longshore and
Warehouse Union (ILWU), and condemned President
Bush's invocation of the Taft-Hartley Act and
threats to empower the Department of Homeland
Security. Greens see special danger in possible
plan by the President to send the Navy to work as
scab labor at the docks, which would effectively
strip ILWU of its collective bargaining rights.

"Bush's equation of collective bargaining by
working people with terrorism is despicable,"
said Tim Harthans, Iowa Green candidate for the
U.S. Senate. "It reveals that the purpose of his
Homeland Security Department is suppression of
domestic dissent. In this case, Bush is invoking
national security for the benefit of Wal-Mart,
the Gap, Chiquita, and other corporate members of
the West Coast Waterfront Coalition and Pacific
Maritime Association in their attempt to break
the power of the union and the right of working
people to organize on the Pacific coast docks."

Greens have called repeatedly for repeal of the
Taft-Hartley Act, and criticized the Democratic
Party for failing to repeal it during the years
Democrats held Congress and the White House.
This is the first time that Taft-Hartley has been
used in the case of a lockout.

"President Bush, in using Taft-Hartley to force
the 10,500 dockworkers back to work for 90 days,
is imperiling the job protection, decent wages,
and pensions of 170,000 Americans," said Vivian
Houghton, Green candidate for Delaware Attorney
General, who received the endorsements of the UAW
and Coalition of Black Trade Unionists in her
state.

"Bush also risks an expanded crisis, as workers
around the world have threatened to shut down
ports to U.S. ships and cargo," Houghton added.
"The blame for empty shelves and economic
consequences of the lockout should not be
directed at the dockworkers, but at President
Bush and the ruthless CEOs of Wal-Mart and other
companies seeking to break the ILWU and hold our
economy hostage."


MORE INFORMATION

The Green Party of the United States
http://www.greenpartyus.org
National office: 1314 18th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20036
202-296-7755, 866-41GREEN

International Longshore and Warehouse Union
http://www.ilwu.org

Index of Green Party candidates in 2002
http://www.greens.org/elections


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