At National Gathering, Firefighters Not Impressed By Potential GOP Candidates

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(AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

It only took one observation for former Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley, appearing before 700 members of the International Association of Fire Fighters union on Tuesday to eclipse the five Republicans who spoke before him.

"There are two very important things that you did not hear from any of today's Republican speakers," O'Malley said to the firefighters who were in attendance for the IAFF's Presidential Forum. "One is a commitment to collective bargaining, and the second is a commitment to increasing funding for public safety."

His comments prompted whistles and a standing ovation, an enthusiastic response from an audience that had remained largely unmoved by the conservative speakers. The GOP's half-hearted attempt to embrace labor but avoid divisive economic issues at the conference had fallen flat.

"The men and women of the IAFF in attendance at this conference understand how important collective bargaining, pensions and the safety of their members is," said Kelly Fox, president of the Washington State Council of Fire Fighters, after the forum concluded. "The reaction to the speakers reflected where their values and principles are, and they weren't with the Republican candidates."

The March 10 presidential forum, designed to showcase potential presidential candidates, was part of the 2015 Alfred K. Whitehead Legislative Conference, which brought hundreds of professional firefighters from across the country to Washington, D.C., to lobby their elected representatives. Vice President Joe Biden and Senator Elizabeth Warren had both spoken at the conference on Monday. Eight possible presidential candidates attended Tuesday's forum, the second time the IAFF had hosted such an event (the first was in 2007).

Presumed candidates who did not attend included Hillary Clinton (who delivered a speech at the United Nations that day), Senator Rand Paul, and former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, who sent a short pre-recorded video instead. Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, who recently signed his state's anti-union, so-called right-to-work law, declined the invitation. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, who has been heavily criticized by the IAFF for his attacks on organized labor, was not invited.

Labor is historically a liberal stronghold, but Republican politicians seek the support of firefighter and police unions because of the typically widespread public support for first responders.

Michigan's right-to-work law currently exempts firefighters and police unions, although a new bill in the Michigan House threatens to change that. When Walker went after public-sector unions in Wisconsin, he also exempted firefighter and police unions from a ban on collective bargaining.

Although the IAFF has never endorsed a Republican for president, it backed five winning Republican Senate campaigns last year. Individual chapters regularly support local conservatives, and the Florida Professional Firefighters endorsed Jeb Bush for governor in 1998 and 2002. And according to IAFF General President Harold Schaitberger, 44 percent of the union is Republican.

But that 44 percent was quiet on Tuesday. Senators Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Lindsey Graham, and former New York Governor George Pataki won only polite applause and little else from the crowd.

U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent, spoke first on Tuesday, using the friendly political climate to his advantage by decrying Wall Street and the excess of corporate influence in politics.

"How does it happen that when work productivity goes up, wages go down?" Sanders asked. "How does it happen that fire departments and police departments and public schools all over this country are starved for funding, at exactly the same time that we give huge tax breaks to the wealthy and the large corporations?"

Former Virginia Senator Jim Webb, the only Democrat to have officially launched his presidential exploratory committee, also emphasized economic inequality. "Our country was hit by a terrible, devastating recession brought on by outright greed and irresponsibility in the financial sector," Webb said, adding that while the stock market has tripled since the recession, wages and salaries have declined.

For the Republicans, the forum was an exercise in rhetoric. Cruz, who appeared in front of a pink screen instead of the standard IAFF logo backdrop, elicited more grumbles than laughs with jokes about Hillary Clinton and the IRS. Rubio's pitch for smaller government and regulatory reform drew a similarly muted response.

Both Pataki and Graham framed their remarks in terms of national security, paying tribute to the first responders who perished on September 11 and warning of the dangers of ISIS and a nuclear Iran.

"I honestly believe we are at greatest risk today than at anytime since September 11th," said Pataki, before launching into a critique of the Obama administration's foreign policy.

Graham echoed this fear during his speech. "I have never seen more threats to our homeland than I do today," he said. "Radical Islam acquiring a weapon of mass destruction is a nightmare to all of us, do you agree?" he asked, to murmured assent and a few nods.

The only Republican whose speech seemed to resonate with the firefighters was U.S. Representative Peter King of New York, a longtime friend of first-responder unions. His strongly voiced commitment to public safety funding drew cheers from the crowd. Taking a jab at Republican colleagues such as Cruz, he said, "I find it really hypocritical to have people come before you and say, 'I stand with the firefighters; we have to be with you,' and then they don't vote to fund the Department of Homeland Security."

One of the IAFF's priorities is increasing federal grants, funded by DHS, to local fire departments. "No member of the House, no member of the Senate should ever deny you the funding that you need to do your job," King said to loud applause.

The warmer response to King highlighted a growing divide between Republicans and even the most conservative labor unions. The national security pitches rang hollow when compared to the IAFF's economic priorities, which include fighting for more funding for fire departments and staving off threats to public-sector pensions.

"Leave it to the further right candidates to accept an invitation to talk to union firefighters and fail to address their middle-class economic issues," said WSCFF President Fox. "They spent more time conjuring up the fear of Middle East instability and the Islamic State than they did on the real economic issues facing firefighters and their families."

Speaking last and after the string of Republicans, O'Malley's pronounced support for collective bargaining and public funding brought down the house. But it wasn't a testament to O'Malley's unique liberalism-any Democrat could have said it.

The fervent response to O'Malley's remarks was the product of frustration over five years of reduced federal funding for fire departments, 12 years of declining wages, and five tepid Republican speeches.

In the 2016 presidential election, when it comes to representing the real needs of first responders, it appears that Democrats still have the advantage.