Trump meets with Teamsters president as Union weighs 2024 approval

Sean M. O’Brien, the general president of the Teamsters union, sat with former President Donald J. Trump at Trump’s oceanfront mansion, Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach, Florida, on Wednesday.

Kara Deniz, a spokeswoman for the union, said the meeting was just one of a series of meetings the Teamsters plan to hold with all presidential candidates.

But this particular meeting, that the union detailed in a lengthy social media post which was accompanied by a photo of Mr O’Brien and Mr Trump, came at a notable time. At a public hearing in November, Senator Markwayne Mullin, a staunchly pro-Trump Republican from Oklahoma, called Mr. O’Brien a ‘thug’, a ‘bully’ and a coward, and challenged him to a fight.

President Biden has called himself the most unionized president in history, as have several leaders of organized labor, and the Teamsters supported his candidacy in 2020. In December, Mr. Biden issued an executive order requiring so-called project labor agreements — which set fixed work, wage and labor standards on construction sites — for all federal contracts over $35 million. That order was a potential boon for the Teamsters union, which will likely control transportation at many of those locations and should be brought into contract talks as funds begin to flow from Mr. Biden’s signature domestic achievements.

Just last week, the Biden administration was called Cole Scandaglia, the Teamsters senior legislative representative, to a high-profile advisory board at the Transportation Department. And in 2022 the board moved Unpleasant supporting a pension fund that affected 350,000 retired Teamster members.

Yet there was Mr. O’Brien next to the beaming Mr. Trump, whose appeal to working-class voters will be key to his re-election. Mr. O’Brien promised the former president a seat at another meeting later this month in Washington, this time with rank-and-file members.

Serious issues must be addressed “to improve the lives of working people across the country, and the Teamsters union is ensuring our members’ voices are heard as we head into a crucial election year,” Mr. O’Brien said in a statement declaration. . “We thank the former president for taking the time during this private meeting to listen to the Teamsters’ top priorities.”

Teamsters leaders have met with other candidates, mainly on the fringes of the 2024 election, and none with Mr. Trump’s profile. The The first two meetings took place last month, with former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, whose presidential campaign has barely registered with voters, and with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the anti-vaccine independent who qualified for Utah’s presidential election this week. The union has also encountered Marianne Williamson and Dean Phillips, Democratic candidates, as well as Cornel West, who is running as a left-wing independent.

Meanwhile, Mr. Biden became the first sitting president to join a picket line when he joined members of the United Auto Workers on strike in Michigan in September. Government pressure helped resolve the strike, and has helped other unions expand their organizing.

But while the UAW’s brash new president, Shawn Fain, has praised Mr. Biden and excoriated Mr. Trump, the UAW has so far not endorsed the president’s re-election bid, and Mr. O’Brien may have added to the expectations of the White House. frustration. As the Teamsters set up meetings with each presidential candidate, the union’s leadership appears determined to maintain its influence, just as Mr. Fain has done.