Hey, this is Kendrick's New Media Director, Kenneth Quinnell. Kendrick wanted me to make sure that you saw these stories from this past weekend. I think these stories show that Kendrick is certainly and ally of labor and a fighter, but also that Democrats certainly don't gain anything by supporting Charlie Crist.
Kendrick Meek released the following statement after receiving the Florida AFL-CIO's endorsement for the general election:
"My entire life I have stood alongside the hardworking men and women of this state who are building up what others have tried to tear down. Working people in Florida need a fighter, a leader who will work for their issues everyday. My fight is your fight, and today I stand humbled and proud to have earned your support. I am looking forward to working to bring good jobs with benefits for middle class families to Florida. I am proud to have hardworking Floridians and their families stand with me as Florida's next U.S. Senator."
Excerpts from Kendrick's speech at the AFL-CIO convention below
From the Post on Politics:
Here are some snippets from Meek’s speech in Jacksonville:
“I have stood with labor, labor has stood with me. You’ve had my back, I’ve had your back. I need you to be with me now. I need you to be with me. I need you to be with me.”
“The nation is watching what we’re going to do in Florida.”
“No one should be able to come in at the last moment to serve his or her politics and say that, ‘I’m your friend.’”
“I’m asking you to fight, scratch, crawl, bite, do whatever you gotta do to help us win.”
“I don’t just want your vote, I need your full support. Members should not have to walk in to the halls when I walk through and say ‘This is one of our co-endorsed candidates.’ Co? What’s that? You’re either walking or you’re running. There’s no jogging.”
“We didn’t have to wait to see what the climate would be or which way the winds blowing or if the environment is right for me to run. This state needed leadership and needs leadership now.”
“I need your full support. When you came to me in the state legislature and said, ‘Kendrick, I need you to stand up and run this amendment. I need you to be with us. I need you to come out to this rally in front of this company that fired three of our workers because we were trying to organize,’ I didn’t say I’d send staff. I said I’ll be there. I wasn’t a co-friend, I was a full friend.”
On a conversation with U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin about the Senate race: “He said, ‘It’s going to be tough. It’s going to be the biggest challenge you’ve ever had in your entire life.’ And he closed with this: ‘You’re going to find out who your friends are.’ He was right. I need you to not only be where you should naturally be, but I need you to be with me 100 percent.”
On Democratic primary opponent Jeff Greene: “Your members did take subprime mortgages you know why? Parents and grandparents want their children and grandchildren to have a better opportunity and environment than they ever had. That’s why we’re alive. That’s why we work every day. And this man set up that situation for it to fail.”
Meek said he’ll win the primary and emerge as a stronger candidate: “This whole thing about ‘Who knows Kendrick?’ and this, that and the other. It won’t be a question because people will know me.”
On issues:
He said Crist supported Senate Bill 6 before he was against it. “The AFL-CIO changed the thinking on that. I don’t care what anybody tells you or what the governor tells you.”
To prevent the bill from coming up next year, he said the state needed to elect Democrat Alex Sink as governor: “Every voter, 99.8 percent of the voters that go out and vote for me will vote for Alex Sink. That’s why it’s important I get your full – full – endorsement. I need you right now.”
“When it came down to the Employee Free Choice Act, there was no question of where I was or where I was going to be. I wasn’t going to be a co-sponsor. No, I’m going to be a prime sponsor. I’m not going to think about voting for it. I’ve already voted for it.”
“I am the only candidate in this race who supported the health care proposal that leveled the playing field for your members for those women, mainly, that are denied health care coverage when they’re on their back looking up at a hospital ceiling and an insurance company turned their back on them. I stood in there. The next six years is going to be pivotal — pivotal — to the backbone of the health care rights of those that work every day.”
“I’ve been against offshore oil drilling from the beginning. It didn’t take oil in the Gulf for me to say I’m against offshore oil drilling. It did not take oil in the Gulf for me to now get religion and say we should be against it.”
“Individuals now (say), ‘Oh, I’m going to call a special session on offshore oil drilling.’ Guess what. Just a few minutes ago the incoming speaker filed a bill that called for it three miles off the coast. Where was your voice then?”
“Eleven people lost their lives because somebody didn’t want to stand up and provide the kind of regulation that they needed. Those mine workers died because somebody didn’t stand up and do what they were supposed to do at a time that somebody pats you on the back and says, you know, ‘How you doing? Let’s go to dinner. Let’s do this, that and the other. You know, let’s not worry about that.’ I am concerned about those individuals who punch in and punch out every day.”
From News Service of Florida (via the Jacksonville Observer):
Meek drew sharp contrasts with Crist, saying that he had a 95 percent lifetime record of supporting positions favored by the AFL-CIO, which is gathered in Jacksonville this week to make general election endorsements.
“For somebody like me, it’s not 80 percent, 70 percent, 50 percent,” Meek said during a raucous speech to union delegates at the Crowne Plaza Jacksonville Riverfront Hotel. “It’s 100 percent. (I have) a 95 percent lifetime record with AFL-CIO. If you can’t stand with me now, when can you stand with me?”
“I play the David role well,” he said, referred to the biblical tale of David and Goliath. “We don’t need 50 percent plus to one to make Kendrick Meek the next United States senator. We can do it with 38 percent, 40 percent.”
But Meek said that he needed the AFL-CIO to do that.
Meek contrasted his long record of supporting union issues with Crist, who told the union Friday that he would be open to some of their biggest priorities now that he is no longer a Republican. Crist said he would consider supporting the federal Employee Free Choice Act, which supporters say would guarantee employees the right to unionize and opponents - including the Republican establishment - say will threaten workers' right to a secret ballot. Crist also said that he would look for ways to have state lawmakers extend unemployment benefits if federal money is approved, as expected.
Meek said that the union did not have to ask where he was on those issues.
AFL-CIO president Mike Williams heaped praise on Meek as he introduced him, calling him “a friend of organized labor.”
“If you want an example of standing up for working families, this next person reflected everything we stand for,” Williams said of Meek.
After his speech, Meek said he was not bothered by having to campaign for the AFL-CIO’s endorsement.
“I wasn’t taken by having a family meeting with the family,” he said. “I think it was important that we share that I’m the best candidate for this race.”
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