Gore Meets With Top Labor Officials to Rekindle Support

In frantic fence mending, Al Gore met Friday with top labor leaders while aides reached out to local unions nationwide. New campaign chairman Bill Daley considered withdrawing from the free-trade fight at the root of Gore’s labor problem.

Meanwhile, more of the unions Gore is counting on to boost voter turnout in November weighed in on his surprise appointment of Daley, a development on Thursday that the Teamsters denounced as a “slap in the face.”

As Commerce secretary, Daley is the top administration lobbyist for the China trade bill despised by organized labor. Gore, too, has argued for the legislation.

“We just can’t seem to break through on the political importance of understanding how strongly working people feel on the trade issue,” said United Steelworkers of America spokesman Gary Hubbard.

“The vice president, he does have our endorsement, but it’s pretty clear that if he’s not listening to us, he may not have the winning edge to succeed because it’s going to be a very close race” against presumptive Republican nominee George W. Bush, Hubbard said.

Privately, Democrats close to Gore said his team has acknowledged the big mistake of not consulting with labor leaders before word leaked on Thursday that Daley would take over the helm of Gore’s presidential campaign from Tony Coelho, who resigned for health reasons.

Gore met at his vice presidential residence with AFL-CIO President John Sweeney and with Gerald McEntee, chairman of the labor federation’s political committee.

After an angry phone conversation with Gore on Thursday, Sweeney pronounced Friday’s hourlong huddle “a really good session,” according to AFL-CIO spokeswoman Deborah Dion, and the issue was apparently put to rest for Sweeney and McEntee, two of Gore’s most ardent supporters.

Gore aides said he also wanted to speak with Teamsters President James P. Hoffa. The Teamsters board, already weighing whether to deny Gore its endorsement, meets next week with Bush and Green Party candidate Ralph Nader. Gore supporters are concerned that if he can’t soothe Hoffa, the Teamsters will sit out the campaign.