By TDU Co-Chair Frank Halstead

TDU members have participated in every single Teamster International Officer election. We know what it takes to run a serious opposition campaign. The Fearless Slate has failed every test. They don’t deserve our support.

The Teamsters have the most democratic International Union elections of any union in North America. TDU won the right to one-member, one-vote elections in 1989 and we secured election rules that level the playing field for opposition candidates. 

Candidates who use those rights and demonstrate membership support get on the ballot.

It Starts with Organizing

Running for International Union office takes organizing. It starts with a petition drive. 

To become accredited as candidates, a slate must collect petition signatures from 2.5% of the members. The required number of signatures this time was 31,344. That’s more than achievable, but you need to organize.

Petitioning gives every slate and candidate a chance to get out and talk to members face-to-face to build support for their vision. 

The Election Rules protect the right of any member to campaign and collect petition signatures in the employee parking lot of any Teamster employer. 

Becoming accredited helps level the playing field by giving a slate access to the IBT membership list and the right to publish campaign literature in the Teamster magazine and on the Teamster website.

I have volunteered in eight International Union election campaigns. In only one of those campaigns was I supporting the incumbent. 

We never failed to get accredited. That’s because we got off of our keyboards and out to Teamster workplaces to spread our message directly to the members. Hundreds of rank-and-file Teamsters volunteered their time to leaflet, talk to members about our campaign and platform, and collect petition signatures.

The Fearless Slate is the first campaign in Teamster history that didn’t get accredited. They didn’t even come close. 

They didn’t build a network of supporters. They didn't go out and talk to members. Running a campaign, like running a union, takes hard work. You can’t do it from your living room. Facebook live speeches and AI videos don’t cut it.

Getting on the Ballot

To get on the ballot, candidates need to be nominated at the Teamster Convention by 5% of the delegates. Every local union holds an election for Convention Delegate where members can run. 

TDU has opposed raising the 5% threshold. Five percent is a reasonable threshold that requires candidates to show they have enough support to justify the expense of an election. 

Getting on the ballot takes hard work, but we succeeded in every election cycle by running rank-and-file candidates for Convention delegate and winning. And we made principled coalitions with local officers. 

In 2016, when TDU supported Fred Zuckerman against Hoffa, the Teamsters United Slate got only 9% of the delegates. But we got 49% of the vote. If we hadn’t organized serious campaigns to win delegate elections against incumbent officers, we would never have gotten on the ballot.

We saw delegate elections as a test. Willie Ford was a UPS feeder driver when he won his race for Convention Delegate in 2016. He joined the Teamsters United Slate as a candidate the same year. 

Today, Brother Ford is the principal officer of Charlotte Local 71 and an International Union Trustee on the O’Brien Zuckerman Teamsters United Slate.

Compare that to the Fearless Slate. Only three of its members are Convention Delegates and none of them are rank-and-filers. Nine Fearless Slate candidates lost their Delegate elections badly or didn’t bother running at all. Some got as little as 7% and 15% of the vote and then denounced the Election Supervisor!

There’s no shame in losing. I ran for Convention Delegate and lost. I also tried to get nominated for International Union office and didn't get on the ballot. I didn’t complain or denounce the Election Supervisor or the independent agencies that ran the delegate elections. I organized.

Will the Fearless Slate Get on the Ballot?

The Fearless Slate may get on the ballot this year or they may not. They don’t know, because they haven’t organized and won delegate elections. They are betting on silent protest votes. There’s nothing “fearless” about that strategy. 

If they don’t make it, they’ll say “the system is rigged” and that members were denied an election. That’s bull. 

The Teamster Election Rules are designed to make sure that candidates who meet a reasonable threshold of demonstrated membership support get on the ballot. But it doesn't work if you don't put in the work. 

TDU backed underdog opposition slates in 1991, 1998, 2001, 2006, 2011, and 2016. If the system was hopelessly rigged, we would never have made it on the ballot. But we did every time. And so did other opposition slates not backed by TDU in 1991, 1998, 2006, and 2011. 

If the Fearless Slate does get on the ballot, we will all be subjected to months of negative attacks from a cynical protest campaign that is not involving members or running to win. Members deserve better.

Leadership is More Than Social Media Posts and Negative Attacks

Teamster Elections are designed to give candidates a chance to prove themselves as organizers and leaders. 

Previous opposition campaigns passed the test. They organized, recruited volunteers, held events, collected petition signatures, raised money from members, ran for Convention Delegate, and united members around a platform for change. 

The Fearless Slate limits itself to videos, Facebook posts, podcasts, election protests, and negative attacks.  

Previous campaigns involved members in our union. The Fearless Slate just runs our union down. 

The Fearless Slate can't even run a real campaign. Why would members trust them to run our union?

Accountability, Not Excuses

Leaders own both their failures and their wins. I was involved in five unsuccessful International Union campaigns. But every campaign we ran involved members, built support, and built momentum among the members for our vision of militancy, new leadership, and a new direction. 

In between elections, TDU organized Vote No movements against contract givebacks and campaigns to defend Teamster pensions. We organized on the shop floor and ran members for local union office. 

It took years of hard work to be able to finally build a winning coalition.

Our Election Rules give opposition candidates every opportunity to prove themselves as organizers and leaders on the ground. But it’s up to the campaigns to do the work. 

The Fearless Slate has not done that. They’ve failed every test of leadership. They have the right to run. But they don’t deserve our support.

Frank Halstead is an elected co-chair of the TDU Steering Committee and a Local 572 shop steward at Ralphs Grocery in Los Angeles.