SEIU to WaPo: Don’t Compare Chamber Political Spending to Union Political Spending

Yesterday, Jon Youngdahl, National Political Director of the SEIU wrote a letter to the editor of the Washington Post, in which he pointed to the continued distorted comparison of political spending by labor unions to the political spending of “shadowy” organizations “that have sprung up in the wake of…Citizens United.”  Youndahl reemphasized the key difference between labor union political spending and the U.S. Chamber’s political spending: DISCLOSURE. 

“Most of the political work of the Service Employees International Union is funded by about 300,000 janitors, nurses' aides, child-care providers and other members who voluntarily contribute on average $7 per month to SEIU's Committee on Political Education (COPE).”…

“Here's the irony: Anyone who wants to know where SEIU political dollars come from can go on the Internet and check out the detailed public reports all unions and their political action committees are required to file with the Federal Election Commission and the U.S. Labor Department.”

Youngdahl clarified that “foreign” money is NOT being spent by SEIU on political campaigns:

“Money from SEIU's Canadian members pays for Canadian programs for workers. It is not used on U.S. political campaigns.”

And in summation he wrote:

“The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and the shadowy 527 and 501 (c)(4) groups that have sprung up in the wake of the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling, are conduits for vast sums of undisclosed corporate money that threaten our democracy. We are a union of working people, and the money we spend on politics is money donated by workers.”

Couldn’t have said it better ourselves.