A Teamster posted images of a fund raising letter they received from President Sean O’Brien on r/Union (warning: reddit link).
In the letter, Sean O’Brien claims that Trump is creating a new ‘Worker First’ republican party, and implores the reader to donate as much as they can to the Teamster ‘TEAM Fund’, which will be used to:
- Support Trump’s ‘Pro-Worker’ initiatives, like ‘strategic’ tariffs
- Financially back incumbent ‘pro-worker’ republican candidates for the House and Senate
- Identify pro-labor legislatures in key states and support their campaigns
Sean then introduces the next part of the letter; a message from Josh Hawley, a Christian Nationalist and Trump loyalist state senator who fist pumped the Jan 6th rioters in support.
In the letter Hawley claims Trump has eliminated the “country club elites and business tycoons” from the republican party, as well as ending the “Woke DEI agenda”.
If there was ever any doubt about O’Brien, he’s certainly showing his true colors now, bending the knee to the fascists in power and even going so far as to fund raise for them.
The letter itself:
I’ve worked in three union shops in my life. The majority consistently vote against their own interests. I don’t think this guy is grifting; I think he’s got a ton of Teamsters telling him this is what they want.
I work in a teamsters shop, and the amount of rightwing absolutely bonkers shit is way higher than I’d like. I blame shitty news and shitty podcasts for brainwashing the masses. It’d be nice if the masses stopped for even 10sec to think about the shit they’re hearing though.
I’m also a Teamster (school bus driver). 90% or more of my colleagues are trumpers and it sucks. Ironically, in my district drivers do not have to join the union because a very liberal leftist old Democrat colleague successfully sued the district for the right not to join (I still don’t know why he did this, he’s not been able to explain it coherently). Most of the drivers who haven’t joined the union are anti-trump. If you want me to explain this state of affairs, I can’t.
60% of Teamsters voted for Trump in the last election. Unfortunately a tremendous number of their membership is likely only in the union for personal benefit, and do not understand whatsoever class conflict or have enough altruism to see or care about the bigger picture, and are easily exploited via culture war tactics.
Be sure to participate in any elections to replace O’Brien (I guess Richard Hooker’s Fearless Slate is one of the better options? I’m not a Teamster, so you’ll have to research further), and consider Dual-Carding with the IWW if you can.