Democratic candidates rally with AFT and trade unions at canvas kick-off in Nashua
AFT president and former high school teacher Randi Weingarten began her talk with a homework assignment. Holding up a well-worn copy of Timothy Snyder’s “On Tyranny,” she suggested it as an important guide to this moment and the stakes of the election
NASHUA, NH – The Nashua Teachers Union, American Federation of Teachers (AFT) Local 1044, hosted a canvassing kick-off and rally supporting New Hampshire Democratic candidates on Saturday morning in Nashua. AFT president Randi Weingarten, several Democratic politicians, and multiple union leaders addressed the hundreds of union members gathered at the local office.
U.S. Senator Maggie Hassan, U.S. House minority whip Representative Katherine Clark, Congressman Chris Pappas, Gubernatorial candidate Joyce Craig, and Congressional candidate Maggie Goodlander spoke at the event.
AFT president and former high school teacher Randi Weingarten began her talk with a homework assignment. Holding up a well-worn copy of Timothy Snyder’s “On Tyranny,” she suggested it as an important guide to this moment and the stakes of the election
“The reason I picked this up today is because I’ve never experienced a United States of America that I experienced this past week, where the former chief of staff of a former president – not someone you would call a progressive, but someone who is a long-term military guy, a four-star general – he adds to the canary in the coal mine warning,” said Weingarten. That warning, which most recently came from Donald Trump’s former Chief of Staff John Kelly, has also come from former joint chiefs of staff, other generals, the former attorney general, and former defense secretary. “They basically said the guy they worked for is not to be trusted with our democracy.”
She closed with the reason for the event. “Unless we get out the vote, and unless people vote their dreams, their aspirations, their hopes, we’ll lose this election. I don’t think we’re going to lose. But that means we got to get out the vote,” Weingarten said.
U.S. House minority whip Representative Katherine Clark is from Massachusetts but she made the following connection to NH politics.
“We have in Massachusetts over 800 local unions and half a million members. About 10,000 of those who work in Massachusetts, belong to our locals but live up here. And I’m going to ask every union here to please make sure, in addition to knocking on doors today, please make sure you’re calling those members. There is so much at stake,” Clark said.
Congressman Chris Pappas weighed in on the current state of things in Washington, D.C.
“Republicans have been in charge in the House in Washington and we’ve seen nothing but chaos and dysfunction and extremism. They have taken their eye off the ball when it comes to the problems that everyday Americans face because they’ve been too focused on fighting with each other,” Pappas said. “They’ve threatened to shut down the government just about at every turn. They’ve even pushed us to the brink of defaulting on our debt. And they have radical plans that would seek to end Social Security and Medicare as we know it, to undo the progress that we’ve made in ensuring that Americans have health care and enrolling back people’s fundamental opportunities and freedoms in this country. And we can’t stand for it.”
Goodlander’s remarks were brief but to the point.
“We’re pro-union. We’ve got to fight for unions to get the PRO Act done. We’re pro-workers. We’ve got to fight for workers and working families. At a moment when we’re up against, on the other side of a ballot, people who want to tear down everything we want to build up, we’ve got to fight for freedom,” Goodlander said. “We’re here in the live free-or-die state. No one believes in freedom more than we do. And freedom is on the ballot. I’m so proud to be working alongside all of you.”
Senator Hassan started off with a nod to Goodlander, saying, “It is going to be really great to have another Maggie in the United States Congress. I told her when we first talked that I would just call her Goodlander.” She then told a story from her childhood about her WWII Veteran dad who motivates her in the fight in this election cycle
“Dad, having survived the Depression and the Battle of the Bulge, life for him from then on out was gravy. I never heard him really complain about anything. But he would look at us kids in the morning, and he’d say, “What are you doing for freedom today?” Oh, wow. Which sounds like, yeah, kind of a big thing when you’re nine. But what Dad was really trying to drill into each of us is that freedom is not self-sustaining. Freedom takes each one of us. And in every generation of Americans, there have been enough freedom-loving patriots to save our democracy, time and time again,” Hassan said.
Candidate Craig, who began her political career on a school board, described education as a top priority if she is elected governor saying, “Public education is under attack, and I want to say that as governor, I will ensure that our public tax dollars go to our public schools. I’m often asked what I’ll do on day one, and I’ll tell you, on day one I’m going to be asking for Frank Edelblut’s resignation. So, as your governor, you’ll have a pro-labor, pro-public education, huge supporter in your corner. And I really look forward to working with all of you to make the positive change that we need in New Hampshire,” Craig said.
Nine days to go until Election Day.
