Ohio Gov. John Kasich
The 2010 elections were a disaster in many ways, but the Republican wave at the state level was especially hard on labor, with high-profile attacks on unions from Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and Ohio Gov. John Kasich, and lower-profile but deeply damaging attacks in other states. So it makes sense that, for 2014, the AFL-CIO is
refocusing on state elections, targeting Walker and Kasich, as well as Florida's Rick Scott, Pennsylvania's Tom Corbett, Michigan's Rick Snyder, and Maine's Paul LePage:
“While a lot of the attention here in the Beltway has been around who’s going to control the Senate or what’s going to happen in the House, for most Americans, what’s really important in 2014 is going to be what happens to the governors who have pursued scorched-earth policies in their states,” [AFL-CIO political director Michael] Podhorzer said. “That’s the arena that we’re focused on. That’s the area that’s going to be most consequential for people’s lives.”
Unions, with their proven ability to reach out to white members and their families, may be particularly important in the states in a midterm year, Podhorzer argues:
It is true, Podhorzer said, that midterm electorates tend to be whiter and less diverse than presidential-year electorates. But he said the AFL-CIO had studied the results of both the 2006 and 2010 elections and concluded that the broad-stroke demographics of turnout would be less significant than the specific, individual voters who show up on Election Day.
Looking at those two midterm election years, Podhorzer said: “Almost all of the major demographic categories are identical, but there’s incredible activity happening inside those demographics.”
In Ohio, for instance, the fight over Senate Bill 5 showed clearly that there were many 2010 Kasich voters who did not think they were voting for a broad attack on collective bargaining rights. In 2014, those people will be better primed to understand what Kasich's rhetoric really means.
The AFL-CIO will once again be focusing not on television advertising but on more grassroots forms of engagement in election efforts, Podhorzer said, and while the governors will be top targets, that doesn't mean an abandonment of federal campaigns.