Major union leaders (NABTU) support Biden while they criticize Trump.

TFD – Delve into the political dynamics of the upcoming election as North America’s Building Trades Unions (NABTU) endorses Joe Biden’s infrastructure bill. Understand the union’s strategic support and its potential impact on the 2024 political landscape, contrasting Biden’s approach with Trump’s stance on labor policies.

Joe Biden will land a major union endorsement Wednesday from North America’s Building Trades Unions, whose leaders say the president has his infrastructure bill largely to thank for it.

NABTU officials are launching an eight-figure organizing operation to try to deliver its 250,000 members in the battleground states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin for Biden, in one of their earliest-ever presidential endorsements.

According to those briefed on the procedures, the Teamsters, whose support is being sought by both Biden and Donald Trump, are NABTU members but did not participate in Tuesday’s board decision. Once the Democratic and Republican conventions are over, they will endorse.

With three million members nationally, NABTU’s support is more fervent than its endorsement of Biden in 2020. Additionally, it occurs at a time when a sizeable portion of the union’s rank-and-file has broken with the leadership of the traditionally Democratic union in ways that are having an impact on elections. This has sparked concerns about the political prospects of the upcoming union membership generation.

In an interview announcing the endorsement, NABTU President Sean McGarvey told CNN about Biden: “It’s almost like the perfect leader was sent at the perfect time for working people.”

On Wednesday, Biden is scheduled to make an official appearance at the union’s conference in Washington. The union leaders hope that Biden’s acceptance will be interpreted as a direct challenge to Trump, who they claim actively sought out the support of union leaders and members during his administration but was not successful in doing so. The NABTU has demanded that Trump step down following the rebellion on January 6, 2021.

McGarvey praised Biden’s achievements for working people, pointing to the Inflation Reduction Act, the CHIPs Act, the American Rescue Plan from the Covid era, the investments and union rights included in the Infrastructure Act, and more. He said that, at the time, the leadership of his union supports Biden more than many of his members, who, according to him, were roughly evenly divided between Biden and Trump in 2020 and have remained so ever since.

They believe that Joe Biden and Donald Trump are simply two politicians who are the same old, same old,” McGarvey added. “Look, this isn’t the same old, same old.”

The building trades union and Trump have a long history together in the private sector; numerous of their initiatives from the 1980s and 1990s involved direct collaboration and even partial financing through a union-owned financial services company.

“It was a struggle to collect from him to repay us, and he was one of the worst clients we have ever had,” McGarvey remarked.

The Trump tower in Chicago, where the project manager position was advertised in the first season of “The Apprentice,” marked the end of the financial partnership.

During his time in the White House, McGarvey said he spoke with Trump about securing support for multi-employer pension funds in the first Covid-19 relief measure in 2020. The union was keen to back Trump’s pledges of an infrastructure plan.

“I’m going to be loved by all of your people, right, Sean?” McGarvey remembered that Trump told him over the phone.

But none of that materialized, which, according to McGarvey, has further highlighted the differences with Biden, in addition to the union jobs that have been established and the legally mandated apprenticeship programs and long-term worker rights.

A weekly, monthly, or annual infrastructure discussion is what Donald Trump does. Brent Booker, the president of the Laborers’ International Union of North America, commented mockingly, “He was committed to it, it was going to be easy for him.”

Trump campaigned on a $1 trillion infrastructure program, which he kept bringing up throughout his administration, but he never actually introduced a bill or proposal.

According to McGarvey, he has had a different vibe in talks with Biden than he has with Trump. Twice, the president has taken Biden by the shoulders and demanded that he reap the rewards of all the legislation that was passed during his administration and ensure that training facilities are being extended to inner cities and rural areas.

For those members who aren’t pulled to Trump for other reasons—whether it’s his stance on immigration or his overall pledge to upend the way the government operates—Booker claimed that “it’s a powerful argument.”

“When they know what he’s done for them, everything points to moving the needle dramatically,” Booker said of Biden.

Through linking members through local union halls, social circles, and at home, the union will now support outreach activities that will impact hundreds of thousands of members and their families in the blue wall states that Biden swung from Trump in 2020 and that will be critical to 2024.

They say, ‘I didn’t vote for him last time, but man, he’ll have my vote next time,'” McGarvey said. Their eyes light up when you have the time to explain where these opportunities come from.” “I promise to put in the necessary effort in the states that count, along with the financial resources and hands-on support to ensure that everyone who needs to know the details is aware of them and can, for the first time in a generation, vote in their economic interests.

Union officials, who joke off the possibility of an enraged reaction on Truth Social, hope that Trump, in particular, feels their brushback: McGarvey remarked, “I really don’t give a f**k if he’s pissed.

When questioned about the endorsement and McGarvey’s remarks on the former president, a Trump spokesperson remained silent.

In a statement about the endorsement, Biden campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez said Trump turned infrastructure “into a punchline,” but “Biden kept true to his word, and at every step of the way throughout his presidency, he’s fought like hell for union workers.”

Upon receiving a text message while in flight, campaign co-chair Mitch Landrieu—a former infrastructure coordinator for the administration—elaborated that the endorsement is related to the president fulfilling his pledge to reconstruct the nation in a manner that generates well-paying union jobs and establishes the most robust economy in recent memory. He concluded by saying that “if you want more of it, you stay the course and push ahead.”

Landrieu expressed his satisfaction with the infrastructural investments and the political results obtained by others. He wrote, “A watched pot never boils.” “Until it happens.”

CORRECTION: This story originally mentioned a Teamsters convention in error. Not one is planned.