'Matt Bevin has been disastrous for us'
By BERRY CRAIG
AFT Local 1360
Bill Finn was a man on a mission.
"Everybody knows [Republican Gov.] Matt Bevin is notorious for attacking labor," said Finn, Kentucky State Building and Construction Trades Council state director. "We need champions that will look out for us."
Finn meant the whole state AFL-CIO-endorsed Democratic slate: Andy Beshear for governor and Jacqueline Coleman for lieutenant governor; Greg Stumbo for attorney general; Heather French Henry, secretary of state; Sheri Donahue, auditor; Michael Bowman, treasurer; and Robert Haley Conway, agriculture commissioner.
Finn drove more than 200 miles from Louisville to Paducah and on to Murray Monday morning to meet the seven candidates, who were on an election eve bus tour through western Kentucky. Also aboard were former governor Steve Beshear (Andy's dad) and House Minority Leader Rocky Adkins.
"Every candidate on the Republican ticket is bad for labor," Finn said. "Mike Harmon was a bad vote for labor. Alvarado was a bad vote for labor."
Before he was elected agriculture commissioner in 2015, Harmon was one of the most anti-union members of the Kentucky House.
Likewise, state Sen. Ralph Alvarado, Bevin's running mate, fiercely opposes unions. He voted for the state's "right to work" law and for legislation that repealed the prevailing wage. Alvarado is all in for the continuing Bevin-GOP anti-union agenda.
Since he was sworn in nearly four years ago, Bevin has commanded the Kentucky front in the GOP's nationwide holy war against organized labor.
Besides Finn, Machinists Barry Reed, Jon Noles and Lance Phelps were in the Murray crowd. The trio belongs to Calvert City-based IAMAW Local Lodge 1720.
"It's a clear choice between Andy Beshear and Matt Bevin," Reed said. "Matt Bevin came after us with 'right to work.' If we ever want to turn Kentucky back, we have to take that opportunity now.
"Matt Bevin has been disastrous for us. If we lose this one, we reaffirm in Kentucky that labor's still on the chopping block and we're still on a race to the bottom."
Deni Kamper from WLKY TV in Lexington rounded up Reed for an on-camera interview. "We think if we get our members out there to vote we'll have very positive results," he told her.
Phelps said he was voting for Beshear to get even with Bevin for RTW. "He attacked us," said Phelps, adding that turn-about is fair play.
Noles remembered that after Bevin went after unions, he attacked public school teachers. "Look at what he's done to teachers, the way he's talked about teachers in the state."
Noles also cited PW repeal. "If you look at an issue like prevailing wage, that doesn't just affect the workers. That's less money in their pockets to go on vacation, to go out to eat with their family and buy a new car. Some of these small businesses sometimes miss that--that workers are where the money comes from and that you need to support workers to support the economy."