Labor unions used to be the backbone of the Democratic Party.

But over the past several decades, political and economic trends in the U.S. and around

the world caused a realignment.

Michigan Republicans had declared war on workers trying to ram through a so-called right-to-work

law.

They would essentially gut the state's labor movement, including the historic auto

unions.

Governor Walker today sat here at this desk, assigned the right to work legislation

and make Wisconsin the 25th state to have it.

Majority Republicans approved a bill to strip most collective bargaining rights from public

employees.

The right went to war with unions.

An increasingly neoliberal Democratic Party sometimes joined them.

Trade agreements globalized markets.

Union density plummeted.

The damn labor alliance weakened, and the clout unions held within the Democratic coalition

shrank.

The white working class drifted toward the GOP, and Donald Trump accelerated the drift.

He came to our members and said, I'm going to change the rules of the economy and they

believed him.

Unfortunately, the rules he's changing has hurt them.

He's opposed every increase in the minimum wage.

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