The results of tonight’s primaries set in motion a battle for the soul of California. It’s Main Street vs. Wall Street, with the winner having an opportunity to shape California’s future for decades to come.
After months of obscene campaign spending, billionaire CEO Meg Whitman will use her seemingly unlimited fortune to try to stage a hostile takeover of our state. She’s made clear that, if elected, she plans to bring a Wall Street agenda to California. What that means for working families is more massive tax giveaways for corporations and the wealthy, and wholesale cuts to education, public safety and programs that our state’s most vulnerable rely upon. Whitman’s economic philosophy, which she honed as a corporate executive and director in places like Goldman Sachs, is simple: What’s good for Wall Street and the wealthy is good for everyone. California families know all too well just how flawed that philosophy is.
The contrast between the candidates couldn’t be starker. Jerry Brown shares the Main Street values that built this state’s economy into a global powerhouse and expanded our middle class. Brown has a spent a lifetime fighting for working families. He presided over the creation of nearly 2 million jobs as Governor. He fought the exploitation of workers by large corporations as Attorney General. His experience, values and leadership are exactly what this state needs to get back on track.
It’s equally critical that Sen. Barbara Boxer is sent back to Washington to continue to fight for working families on key issues like financial reform, health care and workers’ freedom to join unions. Boxer is a champion for working families. Californians can’t afford to have a Senator like failed CEO Carly Fiorina, who joins Whitman on the “Wall Street Express” ticket.
With record unemployment, a huge budget gap and a rapidly shrinking middle class, the challenges California faces in the next four years are epic in proportion. Because the stakes are so high, the California labor movement intends on engaging like never before. We’ll counter Whitman’s massive spending with an unprecedented grassroots campaign to reach voters on the issues they care about: jobs, health care, retirement security and rebuilding the middle class. We’ll work harder than ever to re-elect Sen. Boxer to the US Senate and send more worker-friendly candidates to Sacramento.
The battle for California’s future begins tonight. Workers look forward to meeting the challenges that face our state and using this election as the springboard for California’s economic rebirth.
Art Pulaski is executive secretary-treasurer at the California Labor Federation, which represents more than 2 million workers in 1,200 unions throughout the state.