FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 3, 2018
Contact: Alec Zimmerman
(608) 257-4765
Running as a labor activist, uncovered interview shows he called unions “lazy” & “dinosaurs”
[Madison, WI] — Randy Bryce is a phony. While he runs around the 1st Congressional District touting his labor credentials, uncovered interviews show that he attacked unions during the Act 10 debate, calling them “lazy” and saying that they had become “dinosaurs.” Bryce’s uncovered remarks seem to have created a rift in the labor movement – with organizations now attacking Bryce over his hypocrisy.
Check out the story from the Journal Sentinel here or find excerpts below.
Randy Bryce called unions lazy, said they had become dinosaurs before his congressional run
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Patrick Marley and Mary Spicuzza
July 2, 2018
Randy Bryce — the labor activist now running for Congress — blamed unions as much as Gov. Scott Walker for severe limitations on collective bargaining, according to a new book.
“People think that unions are useless today, that we’re dinosaurs,” Bryce said in 2015, according to the book. “Well, how did that happen? We let it happen. The labor movement has become lazy, because it’s something that’s been handed to us.”
…
In the book, Bryce is paraphrased as saying the leaders and rank-and-file members of unions had been so timid that they bore as much blame as Walker and other Republicans for Act 10 and the right-to-work law.
Kaufman first reported Bryce making some of his comments — including that unions were as responsible as Republicans for the labor limits — in a 2015 article in the New York Times Magazine.
…
Union leaders who were involved in the fight against Act 10 said they didn’t agree with Bryce’s claim in the book that unions are as responsible for the labor restrictions as Republicans.
“I think the statement is misplaced,” said John Matthews, the former long-time director of the Madison teachers union. “Act 10 wasn’t the result of public-service unions being timid. … I really disagree with what Randy’s saying there.”
