Labor-Backed Party Ousts Democrat With Koch and AFL-CIO Backing

http://www.inthesetimes.com/working/entry/13264/reardon_schaufler_working_families_party_unions_koch_brothers/

Tuesday May 29, 2012 10:53 am

By Josh Eidelson



Progressive candidate Jeff Reardon with canvassers in Oregon. (Photo via Working Families Party)

Working Families Party calls Oregon Democratic primary win a national model

In Oregon's May 15 primary, progressive challenger Jeff Reardon scored a two-to-one victory over Mike Schaufler, a five-term Oregon Assembly Democrat who appeared safe just months before his defeat. Reardon’s victory relied on support from the labor-backed Working Families Party, in coalition with environmentalists, MoveOn, and unions—though the state AFL-CIO, and some of its affiliates, stuck with the incumbent.

The Working Families Party, a progressive, labor-backed third party, hails Reardon's victory as a national model. “Winning a race like this,” says WFP State Director Steve Hughes, “in the face of someone that’s funded by the lobbyists as he was, sends a message that we can hold these people accountable.”

Following this month’s election, The Oregonian declared Reardon’s victory to be the WFP’s “coming out.” Reporter Jeff Mapes wrote that the party hadn’t previously had “a big impact here,” but it “essentially ran Reardon’s canvassing operation.”

For the Oregon WFP, Schaufler represented both an obstacle and an opportunity. Schaufler had repeatedly sided with the GOP on key votes, including opposing banking regulations, environmental protections, and the establishment of a state health insurance exchange. The partisan split in the legislature—30 Democrats and 30 Republicans—heightened the impact of those defections. Hughes charges that Schaufler was also “the guy that sits in the [Democratic] caucus meeting, and then goes out and tells the corporate lobbyists what the plans are.”

FULL story at link.