State Issue 2 goes down in flames as unions claim win

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — The state’s new col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing law was defeated Tues­day after an expen­sive union-backed cam­paign that pit­ted fire­fight­ers, police offi­cers and teach­ers against the Repub­li­can establishment.

In a polit­i­cal blow to GOP Gov. John Kasich, vot­ers hand­ily rejected the law, which would have lim­ited the bar­gain­ing abil­i­ties of 350,000 union­ized pub­lic work­ers. With more than a quar­ter of the votes counted late Tues­day, 63 per­cent of votes were to reject the law.

AFL-CIO Pres­i­dent Richard Trumka said vic­tory for unions was achieved among Democ­rats and Repub­li­cans in urban and rural counties.

“Ohio sent a mes­sage to every politi­cian out there: Go in and make war on your employ­ees rather than make jobs with your employ­ees, and you do so at your own peril,” he said.

At a cel­e­bra­tion at a down­town Colum­bus hotel, Ohio Demo­c­ra­tic Party Chair­man Chris Red­fern said Repub­li­cans and Kasich overreached.

“He lit­er­ally thought he knew more than every­one else,” Red­fern said.

Asked whether the col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing law, called Issue 2, was a ref­er­en­dum on Kasich, Red­fern said, “Absolutely. He was the face of the cam­paign. John Kasich chose to put his face on this cam­paign for the last eight weeks. The peo­ple of the state pushed back.”

Kasich planned to issue a state­ment later Tuesday.

Labor and busi­ness inter­ests poured more than $30 mil­lion into the nation­ally watched cam­paign, and turnout was high for an off-year election.

The law hadn’t taken effect yet. Tuesday’s result means the state’s cur­rent union rules will stand, at least until the GOP-controlled Leg­is­la­ture deter­mines its next move. Repub­li­can House Speaker William Batchelder pre­dicted last week that the more palat­able ele­ments of the col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing bill — such as higher min­i­mum con­tri­bu­tions on worker health insur­ance and pen­sions — are likely to be revis­ited after the dust settles.

Ear­lier this year, thou­sands of peo­ple swarmed the State­house in protest when the bill was being heard. The bill still allowed bar­gain­ing on wages, work­ing con­di­tions and some equip­ment but banned strikes, scrapped bind­ing arbi­tra­tion and dropped pro­mo­tions based solely on senior­ity, among other provisions.

Kasich and fel­low sup­port­ers pro­moted the law as a means for local gov­ern­ments to save money and keep work­ers. Their effort was sup­ported by the Ohio Cham­ber of Com­merce, the National Fed­er­a­tion of Inde­pen­dent Business-Ohio, farm­ers and others.

We Are Ohio, the largely union-funded oppo­nent coali­tion, painted the issue as a threat to pub­lic safety and middle-class work­ers, spend­ing mil­lions of dol­lars on TV ads filled with images of fire­fight­ers, police offi­cers, teach­ers and nurses.

Celebri­ties came out on both sides of the cam­paign, with for­mer vice pres­i­den­tial can­di­date Sarah Palin and singer Pat Boone urg­ing vot­ers to retain the law and for­mer astro­naut and U.S. Sen. John Glenn and the Rev. Jesse Jack­son urg­ing them to scrap it.

Labor and busi­ness inter­ests poured more than $30 mil­lion into the nation­ally watched cam­paign, with the law’s oppo­nents far out­spend­ing and out­num­ber­ing its defenders.

Oppo­nents reported rais­ing $24 mil­lion as of mid-October, com­pared to about $8 mil­lion raised by the com­mit­tee sup­port­ing the law, Build­ing a Bet­ter Ohio.

Tuesday’s result in the closely divided swing state was expected to res­onate from state­houses to the White House ahead of the 2012 pres­i­den­tial election.

Ohio’s bill went fur­ther than a sim­i­lar one in Wis­con­sin by includ­ing police offi­cers and fire­fight­ers, and it was con­sid­ered by many observers to be a barom­e­ter of the national mood on the polit­i­cal conun­drum of the day: What’s the appro­pri­ate size and role of gov­ern­ment, and who should pay for it?

Kasich has vowed not to give up his fight for stream­lin­ing gov­ern­ment despite the loss.

For oppo­nents of the law, its defeat is antic­i­pated to ener­gize the labor move­ment, which largely sup­ports Democ­rats, ahead of Pres­i­dent Barack Obama’s re-election effort.

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Asso­ci­ated Press writ­ers Ann San­ner in Colum­bus and Lisa Corn­well in Cincin­nati con­tributed to this report.

Posted by Jason Hawk on Nov 8 2011. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.