AFL-CIO Launches TV Ad in Several Wisconsin Markets Featuring Union Veteran on McCain's Economic Record

For Immediate Release
Contact: Andrea Gage 262-309-0754   
   
AFL-CIO Launches TV Ad in Several Wisconsin Markets
Featuring Union Veteran on McCain’s Economic Record as
First Action of New Union Veterans Council
“Every Vet Respects John McCain’s War Record; It’s His Record in
the Senate
I have a Problem With,” Union Vet Jim Wasser Says in Ad
www.unionveterans.org

(Milwaukee, July 9) -- The AFL-CIO today announced the launch of a
television advertising campaign featuring union veteran Jim Wasser, a
Vietnam combat veteran, calling on working people to let Sen. John
McCain  know that his economic agenda is “not what we need.”  The ad
is the first  major action of the newly formed Union Veterans Council,
which will be  announced tomorrow in Dayton, Ohio. A Wisconsin Union
Veterans Council will  be announced at a workers’ roundtable event
tomorrow at the Building Trades  Council in Milwaukee.  
 
The Union Veterans Council will enlist millions of veterans to improve
urgent veterans’ and pocketbook issues and expose the records of
candidates  for office at every level on these issues.  AFL-CIO
President John Sweeney  said the new council will reach out to 2.1
million union veterans as well as  other veterans and current enlistees
in the Armed Services who are union  members.

The ad will begin running in the Green Bay, La Crosse and Wausau media
markets tomorrow and will air through the end of July. 

Wasser, an International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) union
electrician and US Navy veteran who served in Vietnam, says that
McCain’s  record shows his priorities on issues like job investment
and veterans’  health care are not those of veterans and working
families.

“Every vet respects John McCain’s war record,” Wasser says in the
ad. “It’s  his record in the Senate I have a problem with.”

Wasser goes on to point out that the $10 billion McCain supports
spending in  Iraq could be used to help create jobs in states like
Wisconsin, which have  been especially hard hit by the sinking job
market, housing crisis and  skyrocketing costs of gas and food.

“Our nation’s veterans deserve much better than the failed Bush
economy has  given them,” said AFL-CIO President John Sweeney. “With
the formation of the  AFL-CIO Union Veterans Council, veterans will be
front and center in the  effort to put our country back on track.”

In addition to airing in Wisconsin, the ad will also run in Michigan,
Minnesota, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia.  The ad will run in
communities  in those states that have been hard hit by the failed Bush
economic agenda  and rapidly souring economy.  The ad will run for three
weeks, through the  end of July.  View the ad at
http://www.aflcio.org/issues/politics/unionveterans2008_videos.cfm

The formation of the national Union Veterans Council coincides with the
formation of state councils in five states -- Wisconsin, Minnesota,
Colorado, Ohio and West Virginia. In the coming weeks, Pennsylvania,
Michigan and Virginia and other states are expected to form councils.

The effort is part of the broadest mobilization of working people in
history. The AFL-CIO is currently engaging more than 13 million union
voters  in 24 priority states, including Wisconsin, on issues such as
health care  reform, good jobs, fair trade and the freedom to form and
join unions.  In  early March, the AFL-CIO launched its national
“McCain Revealed” campaign,  which focuses on educating union
voters about John McCain’s anti-worker  record and plans and calling
on McCain to chart a different course that puts  working families above
corporate interests. 

For a full script of the “Not Now” ad, please contact the AFL-CIO
Media  Outreach Department at 202-637-5018.

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