Labor Tries to Recover From Blunder

Los Angeles union leaders have backed away from a shocking political blunder, their endorsement of Mayor Richard Riordan, an anti-labor Republican who put on a thin pro-union veneer to win their support for his reelection bid.

Riordan supporters in the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor got the preliminary endorsement mostly by arguing that he was a dead-bang winner in his fight against state Sen. Tom Hayden, and the federation should not antagonize the mayor.

That kind of thoughtless pragmatism will sabotage the new national AFL-CIO leaders’ hope to revive the once influential Democratic coalition of liberals, labor and minorities. Riordan is not furiously anti-union, and probably would throw labor a bone from time to time. But the multimillionaire venture capitalist with strong ties to corporations wants to turn over much of the city’s services--now done pretty efficiently by relatively well-paid unionized city workers--to private businesses. His business friends, the mayor figures, can get the city’s work done efficiently and on the cheap by cutting wages and benefits and still make a profit.

Riordan’s background should have served as a warning. He helped Mattel relocate jobs from Los Angeles to Mexico to cut labor costs. That may make sense from a profit-driven corporate executive’s point of view but doesn’t do much for the workers in this country.

Riordan’s basic philosophy was clearly shown when he helped finance the successful 1986 campaign to oust from the state Supreme Court labor sympathizers Rose Bird, Joseph Grodin and Cruz Reynoso. The campaign against them won by denouncing them for their reluctance to support the death penalty. Nothing was said about their progressive views on other issues.

Riordan opposes the living wage proposal, now before the City Council, which would hike wages for workers at private firms doing business with the city. As a sop to labor, the mayor says he would not fight it, but only if it’s amended in a way that would gut it.

Riordan is running his own slate of candidates against labor’s for the commission to reform the city charter. Labor support of Riordan would have hurt its own slate and indirectly helped his, alienating labor’s friends on the City Council.

Riordan ardently wooed construction worker unions by promising to promote growth in Los Angeles, which would mean more jobs; he courted the hotel and restaurant union by saying he would try to help their campaign to unionize the anti-union New Otani Hotel, although he has yet to follow through.

Riordan wants to be seen as a political neutral. But his heart and his affiliation are with a Republican Party that is strongly anti-labor.

Tom Hayden, Riordan’s rival, is not an anti-growth candidate, but says he wants to be sure that growth doesn’t result in damage to the environment. That partly divides labor because some construction unions want more jobs and worry less than their nominal allies about the environmental impact.

But loyalty to a longtime political ally was set aside when the labor federation’s political action committee voted to endorse Riordan over Hayden.

Since that move apparently was going to be defeated at a meeting of representatives of all 320 unions affiliated with the federation, its executive board has opted for a “no endorsement” position that now must be submitted to the full meeting. Then each union will be free to back its own choice.

The initial support of Riordan was startling because Hayden is a progressive, pro-union candidate who has voted 97% of the time in favor of labor’s positions in the state Senate. He has rallied support for union causes at innumerable labor and progressive rallies.

He is cheered wildly by unionists every time he speaks for labor. He has marched often with striking workers on picket lines. He favors the union-backed living wage ordinance, without wrecking it as Riordan wants to do. Hayden’s union supporters, like Steve Nutter of the garment industry’s UNITE and former federation executive secretary William Robertson, say endorsing Riordan would send the wrong message that labor support can be won with nice-sounding words and a few almost meaningless gestures.

To be consistent with labor’s national goals, the federation should endorse Hayden. But if nothing else comes from the interunion battle, it proved the AFL-CIO is far from the monolithic organization many of its critics charge.