Tell the FEC to Investigate Wal-Mart for Electioneering

Posted by ZP Heller, Brave New Films at 12:26 PM on August 12, 2008.

American Rights at Work is demanding the Federal Election Commission investigate Wal-Mart for electioneering.  This comes on the heels of The Wall Street Journal's report that exposed Wal-Mart for telling its employees not to vote for Barack Obama and other pro-worker candidates who support the Employee Free Choice Act.  Over 40,000 people have already signed the petition from American Rights at Work, which they're planning to deliver to the FEC this Thursday. 

As I reported earlier, EFCA would enable workers to unionize more easily, fostering job stability, fair wages, and adequate health care benefits.  To be sure, it would be a  nightmare for Wal-Mart, which has already spent millions quashing employees' efforts to unionize using intimidation, discrimination, retaliation, and rapid response teams flown in on private jets.  According to Michael Whitney of America Rights at Work, Wal-Mart's latest anti-union propaganda ploy wasn't the company's first assault on EFCA either.  Wal-Mart has been funding the Coalition for a Democratic Workplace, a $30 million campaign that belies its name by working on behalf of anti-union lobbyists and right-wing policy groups to spread lies about EFCA and the candidates who back it.

The fact is that the majority of American workers—60 million—say they would support a union if they could.  So don't be duped by right wingers who claim EFCA isn't in workers' best interests, or that it's a divisive piece of legislation for Democrats.  Just this past weekend, conservatives and business groups alike were thrilled by George McGovern's anti-EFCA tirade in Friday's WSJ.  But as Ian Welsh at FireDogLake noted, McGovern is in bed with loathsome lobbyist Rick Berman and his Center for Union Facts, another deviously named but highly well-funded anti-union campaign working with Wal-Mart.    

As the world's largest retailer, Wal-Mart must be forced to set a better example regarding labor practices.  And here's our chance to make them by signing American Rights at Work's petition.  If Wal-Mart broke the law by threatening and scaring employees about which candidates to vote for this November, compel the FEC to hold the company accountable.  For more on Wal-Mart's anti-union ways, check out Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price.

Tagged as: walmart, unions, barack obama, fec, efca, 2008 election, lee scott

ZP Heller is the editorial director of Brave New Films. He has written for The American Prospect, AlterNet, The Philadelphia Inquirer, and The Huffington Post, covering everything from politics to pop culture.