Putting pressure on politicians is what they do
PETER CALLAGHAN; THE NEWS TRIBUNE
The state capital was roiled earlier this month with the shocking news that politics can at times be political.
It was so shocking that Gov. Chris Gregoire and the leaders of the House and the Senate put the clamps on a controversial bill and ordered a police investigation to determine if politics are legal in Washington state.
The State Patrol determined that they are. Left lying in the wake, however, was the bill in question.
I call the episode shocking because it was portrayed that way by House Speaker Frank Chopp, Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown and their lawyers. A closer examination tends to disappoint mystery fans, however.
It all started when some labor leaders met to come up with a plan to push Democratic legislators to take a vote on the so-called Worker Privacy Act. The act says workers could not be forced to attend meetings in which the employer’s political or religious views are expressed.
Labor wants it. Business hates it. So it has become a test to see which has more influence with majority Democrats, or perhaps which side can threaten more effectively.
To that end, a labor operative wrote a memo including this line: “Union leaders would send a message to the State Democratic party and to the Truman and Roosevelt funds from the House and Senate that ‘not another dime from labor’ until the Governor signs the Worker Privacy Act.”
Those funds are Democratic caucus accounts used to boost party candidates. Labor has always been a major donor to those funds, as well as to individual Democratic candidates. Presumably it gives not as a public service but because it wants to help elect people who will support labor issues before the Legislature.
Maybe it was inartful to put it in writing. But the memo wasn’t sent to legislators who are opposing or even neutral on the bill. It was sent mostly to other labor leaders.
Still, the governor and the leaders sent the e-mail to the cops – presumably holding it with tweezers and a rubber glove – and told everyone to refuse comment pending an investigation.
After labor was absolved, some wondered if the real problem was that leadership is frightened of a bill business is using as a test of “business climate.” The Boeing Co. has made it clear that bills such as this might cause it to build a second Dreamliner assembly line in another state. And nothing would make Democratic politicians more dyspeptic than to be accused of “Losing Boeing.”
The dust-up was re-energized when another e-mail was released thanks to a public records request by The Associated Press. It was from a Boeing lobbyist to Gregoire’s Special Assistant for Placating Boeing, Bill McSherry.
“Legislators overwhelmingly want this bill to just go away and not have a vote,” wrote lobbyist Trent House. “However, if a vote is required, most would reluctantly vote with the Labor community despite the known legal and symbolic flaws.”
He then concluded: “The governor cannot sit by and wait for this stuff to go away on its own. It will not.”
Olympia Democratic Rep. Brendan Williams has filed a bill that would make it illegal for companies to threaten to relocate taxpayer-subsidized jobs as a means of influencing the Legislature. Williams figures if it is wrong for labor leaders to say they won’t give campaign contributions to candidates who vote against them, then it must be wrong for companies to threaten economic warfare if lawmakers don’t do as they are told.
When Williams says taxpayer-subsidized jobs, he is referencing the 20-year, $3.2 billion state tax reduction that was used in 2003 to convince Boeing to build the first Dreamliners in Everett. Some figured the company couldn’t use the threat to move jobs again while continuing to benefit from those tax dollars.
But such thinking is from a simpler time, when interests who agreed to be bought off stayed bought off.
Peter Callaghan: 253-597-8657
peter.callaghan@thenewstribune.com
blogs.thenewstribune.com/politics
