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Service Employees International Union issues press release blasting Republicans over government shutdown while SEIU Local 1 strikes on Obamacare-caused cuts.
The federal government shutdown of non-essential workers has many confused and frustrated, not the least of which is the SEIU. Not only does the union represent many of those being furloughed, but the government shutdown is largely caused because of disagreement over the Affordable Healthcare Act, commonly known as Obamacare.
In response to the government shutdown, the SEIU issued this strongly worded press release attacking Congressional Republicans for allowing the shutdown to go into effect. SEIU president Mary Kay Henry was quoted as saying:
Our immediate thoughts are with the working people who are furloughed and will lose needed income, including the 700 SEIU security officers in the Washington D.C [sic] metropolitan region, as well as the millions more who will feel the effects of a shutdown in their lives and their local economies.
The press release goes on to praise Obamacare, declaring that since it is an established law, it shouldn’t be treated as a “political pawn”. The press release doesn’t go so far as to mention that the SEIU has gone so far as to pay members to protest for Obamacare and has consistently held water in advocating for the Act. So not only is the SEIU self-interested in the workers affected by the government shutdown, but they also seem to have a stake in the legislation as well.
What makes the timing of this particular press release particularly interesting, is that it comes at the same time as SEIU Local 1 in Columbus is going on strike- over cuts caused by Obamacare. We’ve previously covered other Obamacare-related strikes by the SEIU, but this one gets major points for style:
SEIU Local 1 members – supported on September 24 by members of other labor unions and other leftists including illegal-immigrant union spokesman Jamal Gilcrease – are on strike to “defend their rights,” noting that they “struggle to make ends meet despite the fact that they clean the offices of some the [sic] richest companies in the city.”
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French, paid $76,221 with money taken from SEIU members last year, explained to Media Trackers that employers’ plans to cut Columbus janitors’ hours due to Obamacare mandates were merely the “latest excuse in a long line of many that we’ve seen from corporate America” to “take money out of the middle class workers’ pocket.”
SEIU local unions are protesting the effects of Obamacare as they begin to feel the pinch of it’s effects. Meanwhile, SEIU International continues to put their political priorities above their workers. This support comes despite the fact they may lose a major boon to recruitment through the loss of their competitive healthcare plans. The SEIU seems to be on the path of shutdown themselves, and they aren’t self-aware enough to see it coming.
The post SEIU Blasts Government Shutdown as Local 1 Strikes over Obamacare Cuts appeared first on SEIU Monitor.
