Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY)
The AFL-CIO is launching an ad in Kentucky simultaneously hitting Sen. Mitch McConnell on
his opposition to raising the minimum wage and his ties to the Koch brothers. The ad is part of the labor federation's "Koch Sisters" campaign, featuring two women with the last name Koch (though not related to each other or the oil billionaire brothers).
In the latest ad, titled "Almost Evil" and timed to coincide with Reid's introduction of a minimum-wage proposal, the women blame the Koch brothers for Republican opposition to raising the minimum wage. "I think it's deplorable that the Koch brothers would want to take away minimum wage," Joyce Koch says in the ad, provided to the Herald-Leader Sunday. She adds in the end: "That's a misuse of wealth and power, and I really think it's almost evil."
To support its claim that the Koch brothers want to eliminate the minimum wage, the AFL-CIO cites a July 2013 article from The Wichita Eagle, in which Charles Koch said he wanted to help the disadvantaged by eliminating a "culture of dependency." Among other things, he mentioned the minimum wage as "something we've go to clear ... out" to remove obstacles in the way of "raising up the disadvantaged and the poorest in this country."
McConnell is strongly opposed to raising the minimum wage, a position that puts him at odds with a majority of Kentucky voters.