Hoffa Appears Headed for Teamster Presidency

Detroit labor lawyer James P. Hoffa emerged the apparent victor Saturday in the national election for the presidency of the Teamsters, putting him in line to take the helm of the powerful and controversial union once ruled by his infamous father, Jimmy Hoffa.

The election of Hoffa, who is regarded warily by the leaders of many other major U.S. unions, could presage a rift in the American labor movement at a time when it is working hard to reinvigorate itself as a political and economic force.

Hoffa’s main rival, Tom Leedham of Portland, Ore., conceded defeat early in the afternoon amid a third day of vote-counting by federal election officials. With more than half of the roughly 420,000 submitted ballots tallied by the end of the day, Hoffa held a 54.6%-to-39.3% advantage over Leedham. The remaining candidate, John Metz of St. Louis, took 6.1% of the vote.

Labor experts attributed Hoffa’s victory in the monthlong election partly to a longing among the rank-and-file for a return to the days when Teamsters, still the nation’s largest private-sector union with 1.4-million members, wielded even greater influence.

But Hoffa’s success may be worrisome news to the leadership of the AFL-CIO, the umbrella group for the nation’s major unions. Although AFL-CIO President John Sweeney congratulated the candidate Saturday and said he looks forward to meeting with him, many experts expect Hoffa to steer the Teamsters away from its tight alliance in recent years with the re-energized labor federation. Hoffa also is likely to end the union’s close ties to the Democratic Party.

Hoffa officials declined to officially declare victory Saturday, even as congratulatory calls poured in to their Washington campaign headquarters. But campaign manager Tom Pazzi spoke as though the win was a certainty, maintaining that Hoffa will “lead the Teamsters in strengthening our union and providing real improvement in the lives of Teamsters members.”

He said the union under Hoffa, 57, would work with both Republicans and Democrats. “We will be focused, I think, more narrowly on what’s in the best interest of the Teamsters Union,” Pazzi said.

Both Hoffa and Leedham, 47, turned down interview requests. In a news release, however, Leedham, head of the Teamsters’ 400,000-member warehouse division and a union local leader, attributed his loss largely to the long head start Hoffa enjoyed in the contest.

“The returns have made it clear that our campaign for rank-and-file power ran out of time,” Leedham said. “Hoffa Jr. campaigned for four years, spent $6 million and had a famous name. But in six short months we came from nowhere to build a grass-roots campaign for rank-and-file power that made union reform the key issue in this election. Even Hoffa had to campaign as a reformer.

“I will take Mr. Hoffa at his word that he will work for real union reform, protect members’ right to vote for top union officers and fight solely for the interests of Teamsters and our families,” Leedham added.

Meanwhile, however, Leedham spokesman Steve Trossman said his group would explore lodging a protest against the Hoffa campaign for possible financial wrongdoing. “There are a number of issues of concern to us.”

Union Battle May Persist

A challenge to the election results, which would be allowed during a 15-day period after the initial vote tally is certified by federal officials, would be just one more twist in an already tangled union battle.

The election was called after the previous contest for the leadership of the union, the showdown two years ago between Hoffa and then-Teamster President Ron Carey, was nullified by federal election officials. The government’s decision wiped out Carey’s reelection to a second five-year term--he had edged Hoffa by a 52%-to-48% margin in the invalidated 1996 vote--and led to his expulsion from the Teamsters. Investigators found that the Carey campaign embezzled more than $800,000 in union funds from the union’s treasury.

Federal authorities also scrutinized the Hoffa campaign’s finances and found various irregularities but didn’t consider any serious enough to disqualify him as a candidate. Five original members of the Hoffa slate, however, were disqualified from the election or expelled from the union.

One of the ironies of Carey’s downfall was that he had been regarded in his first term as a successful reformer who ridded the union of much of its long-standing corruption. Three of his predecessors were convicted and a fourth died under indictment. The government continues to oversee the union under a historic 1989 consent decree stemming from a lawsuit in which federal authorities accused the Teamsters of having a “devil’s pact” with the mob.

Leedham, who had been allied with Carey, launched his campaign after the former Teamster president was knocked out of the race. He pledged to continue efforts to reform the union and won the endorsement of the grass-roots group Teamsters for a Democratic Union, which had provided the backbone of Carey’s support.

But Teamster leaders around the country, even many who previously supported Carey’s reforms, lined up behind Hoffa and, despite waging a vigorous campaign, Leedham never gained widespread name recognition. In fact, the election never generated much attention among union members, with less than 30% of the eligible voters mailing in their ballots.

Hoffa, a husky, tough-talking man who once played college football at Michigan State University, has spent most of his adult life as a lawyer in the Detroit area. He joined the Teamsters in 1993, after taking a job on the staff of a Michigan local, and soon gathered the support of Carey opponents to begin his bid for the union’s presidency.

In his campaign, Hoffa has emphasized that he would restore the union’s power, put its troubled finances in order and unify its membership.

The return of a Hoffa to power is an ironic twist in the federal government’s long-running battle to rid the fabled Teamsters union of mob influence. The senior Hoffa came under constant federal scrutiny after taking over as Teamsters president in 1957. He eventually was convicted of fraud and jury tampering, and was sent to federal prison in Pennsylvania in 1967. In 1971, President Nixon--the first in a string of four Republican presidential candidates endorsed by the Teamsters--commuted Hoffa’s sentence. The elder Hoffa disappeared in 1975 while attempting a comeback bid, and was presumed murdered by mobsters.

On Saturday, one of the congratulatory calls to the younger Hoffa’s headquarters came from Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), whose late brother, Robert, hounded the elder Hoffa in the 1960s when he was the nation’s attorney general.

Federal vote counters were expected to continue their work until Monday. So far they have counted ballots from the Teamsters’ Southern, Eastern and Western regions, which were thought to be the areas friendliest to Leedham. Along with the presidency, there are 21 other spots on the Teamster ballot, including vice presidential seats and trustee positions.

Silverstein reported from Los Angeles and Getter from Washington.