AFL-CIO Registers Thousands of Voters from Pro-Union Homes - Beckley, Bluefield & Lewisburg News, Weather, Sports

AFL-CIO Registers Thousands of Voters from Pro-Union Homes

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CHARLESTON -

The AFL-CIO has registered more than 450,000 new voters from union-supporting households over the past 18 months, according to an Oct. 4 news release from the organization.

According to Nora Frederickson with AFL-CIO, efforts in the Mountain State resulted in 8,653 new voters registering from union households since March 2011. The percentage of union household members registered to vote in West Virginia jumped from 58 percent to 66 percent.

The 450,000 newly registered voters includes 68,000 new voters in Ohio, a highly contested battle ground state, and thousands of voters in the union-friendly states of Colorado and Nevada. The push is part of an attempt to swell the number of Democratic voters and help President Barack Obama win a second term.

"This is the first time we've made this big an effort to increase registration," said Mike Podhozer, AFL-CIO political director. "We're really proud that more union members are going to be engaged. Whoever they vote for, the fact is we're increasing civic participation"

In the 2008 general election, Obama defeated Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., by more than 200,000 votes in Ohio out of about 5 million cast in the state. Voters from union-friendly households have traditionally favored Democrats, and that trend is expected to continue into the 2012 election following efforts by Republicans to weaken collective bargaining rights in Ohio, Wisconsin and Indiana.

Exit polls in 2008 showed 59 percent of voters who lived in pro-union households supported Obama while 39 percent said they supported McCain. Union household voters were similarly split in the two preceding presidential elections as well, according to the news release.

The plan began in March, Podhozer said, when the labor federation began matching lists of union household members with voter registration files from every state. The unions identified about 2.3 million people living in households of active and retired union members who were not registered to vote.  Union leaders hoped to register at least 20 percent of those 2.3 million non-registered and raise the estimated overall union household registration from 20 percent to 75 percent of eligible voters.

Union density is highest in Ohio, according to the AFL-CIO. In Pennsylvania, the union registered 57,000 new voters, as well as 13,500 in Colorado, 10,000 in Nevada and 6,700 in Virginia.

The federation's 56 affiliated unions are doing most of the work and represent about 9 million workers with collective bargaining agreements. Unions expect to spend millions of dollars to re-elect Obama and other Democratic candidates for state and federal office.