Don’t Fear Summer Lee. Fear the Devil’s Bargain Labor Leaders Are Willing to Make Opposing Her

Cancer or unemployment.

That’s the choice Pennsylvanians are being asked to make in 2020.

Do we allow hydraulic fracking to continue to destroy our environment and increase our risk of cancers and other debilitating illnesses?

Or do we clean things up and risk losing jobs?

Some labor leaders seem willing to chose the former on behalf of their constituencies.

That’s why the Pittsburgh-based Allegheny-Fayette Central Labor Council (PA AFL-CIO) voted to oppose the re-election of State Representative Summer Lee, the first black woman elected to the State House from the western part of the Commonwealth.

She chooses life.

And that might put some people out of work.

It’s a sad commentary on the state of the labor movement that union bosses are willing to make this trade – life for a living wage.

And it’s a completely unnecessary choice.

We can have BOTH jobs and health – if Democratic politics allow for minds open enough to see the truth.

Let’s get this straight.

Lee is a badass.

The Democrat represents Homestead and West Homestead – two of the three municipalities in the school district where I work as a middle school teacher. She also represents parts of Pittsburgh, Braddock, Swissvale, Rankin, Turtle Creek, Forest Hills and Churchill.

But the 32-year-old lawyer and community organizer is more than just a politician. She’s a local hero.

Just two years ago, Lee beat 20-year incumbent Paul Costa by a margin of 68-32%.

She helped found UNITE, a grassroots political action committee, which has successfully defeated several old guard Democrats in bed with the fossil fuel industry.

Most notably, UNITE was part of the effort that ousted Allegheny County Council President John DeFazio in favor of another Democratic insurgent, Bethany Hallam. Once again DeFazio’s pro-fracking and fossil fuel platform went down in flames to Hallam’s environmentally friendly policies by a margin of 54%-46%.

Fracking is a relatively new and dangerous method of extracting natural gas from otherwise inaccessible sources like the region’s abundant Marcellus shale. “Fracking fluid” made up of water, sand and harmful chemicals is injected in a high pressure blast into deep rock formations releasing natural gas, petroleum and other substances.

Fracking has been known to increase health risks like respiratory problems, a negative impact on pregnancies, and a host of other problems – and that’s not even considering the risks of spills. The process also has devastating environmental impacts including the escape of greenhouse gases, groundwater pollution and increase risk of earthquakes.

In Harrisburg most debate has centered around removing a Republican-backed sweetheart tax deal for the industry and not outright banning the process altogether.

Lee, Hallam and other UNITE Democrats are changing the conversation, yet some of the area’s labor unions aren’t coming along with these insurgent winners. They’re sticking with establishment figures.

The PA AFL-CIO has endorsed Chris Roland against Lee in the primary. He’s a white North Braddock councilman who supports fracking.

Lee is a Democratic Socialist with a massively pro-labor campaign. She’s been endorsed by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and United Electrical Workers (UE).

She is the only incumbent who the labor council did not endorse.

The only reason is her environmental stance, her race, or both.

Lee supports a Green New Deal and tightening enforcement against illegal air emissions from steel mills.

Roland has already raised $77,635 mostly from local unions. Steamfitters Local 449 and the Laborers’ International Union of North America have both given him $20,000 while the local International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) and Plumbers locals each gave $10,000.

To combat this, Lee has raised $55,789.

Some pundits theorize that the move to stop Lee is doomed from the start because of her incredible popularity in her district. The real motivation is to weaken UNITE’s ability to fundraise against other pro-fracking Democrats.

It’s tragic that the labor movement has come to such a low point with leaders like PA AFL-CIO President Darrin Kelly willing to trade the health and safety of the people living here for the promise of a paycheck.

Kelly has been a vocal opponent of the Green New Deal fearing what it would do to fossil fuel employment in the area.

In an April interview with Payday, he said:

“When you have a situation where you are taking away from someone’s ability to feed their family, that is not going to be looked at favorably. I am going to be against it; I’m going to be vocal against it and not welcome it in Western Pennsylvania.”

He seems to forget that dead people don’t need a paycheck.

Trading the environment and the health and welfare of our friends and neighbors for a living wage is a bad deal.

Moreover, labor leaders opposing environmentalists like Lee ignore key aspects of her proposals.

A Green New Deal would create millions of sustainable new jobs. It would require replacing pipes, weatherizing homes, expanding railways, manufacturing wind turbines – all of which would require people to do the work.

These would be high quality union jobs with good salaries, benefits, safe working conditions, training opportunities, etc.

This opens a once in a generation opportunity for new jobs to upgrade and expand the Commonwealth’s crumbling roads, bridges, energy grid, and water systems. Not only would we repair what exists, we’d build a cleaner, more affordable, and more resilient infrastructure that would be there for our posterity.

We need to expand access to light rail and low-emissions public transit, replace lead pipes, build a smart grid for increased wind and solar power, replace storm water systems to prevent flooding and toxic runoff, and restore wetlands and other natural buffers to protect our communities.

These are exactly the things our labor leaders should be concerned about doing. These are exactly the policies we need to move forward into the future.

It’s time to stop the necrotic paralysis of labor propping up the dying fossil fuels industry. The future is with sustainable energy.

If we want to actually live to see that future, we need to back policies that save our children from getting sick, that preserves Pennsylvania’s natural resources.

Green New Deal Democrats like Lee and Hallam are the future.

It’s time the holdouts in the labor movement get with the program.