Candidate Endorsements on the UE Web

www.ranknfile-ue.org

Under federal election law — and given our union's policies and structure — we have no way of letting you know when our national union, or an autonomous UE local union, has taken democratic action to endorse a candidate for federal office on our website.

Here's Why:

To post endorsements for candidates to any federal office on our website, UE would have to have a separately constituted "Political Action Committee (PAC)" that could buy web space from the national union to make such announcements. Without such an arrangement, unions are prohibited from posting endorsements on their websites.

Proudly, and unlike most other unions, UE does not have a national PAC. Why? Because our approach to politics has always been independent and issue-oriented. In short, we don't spend our members' dues money on politicians. Frankly, we know that working people can't outspend corporate America and the wealthy in buying power and influence — nor should we try. We believe the only effective way to make our voices heard in the political process is through organized and direct political action.

In our political action work, we focus on, and fight for, the issues of importance to our members (as decided by delegates to UE's annual national conventions, or, in rare cases, by the UE's General Executive Board). We depend on a mobilized membership to convey our united message to all levels of government, or, in the rare case of a UE endorsement, to encourage our members to work on behalf of that candidate (we have only endorsed four presidential candidates during all of our 65 national conventions). As a result, we do not have, nor have we historically needed, a national PAC.

Regardless, it is unfortunate that we cannot post endorsement information on our website, even when we can tell you about any other decision we make. The law in question exists only to limit the role unions can play in the electoral process — which, as should be obvious, it does.