In union town, Democratic presidential hopefuls court support from major labor player

From the construction workers and electricians who built this neon-gilded city and the housekeepers who tidy its hotel rooms to the county employees and nurses who take care of its residents, union workers run Las Vegas.

And on Saturday, some of those workers stepped away from their jobs for the separate but perhaps equally important task of vetting six of the 20 candidates vying to become the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee at a forum hosted by the Service Employees International Union and the progressive Center for American Progress Action Fund. Although the event was attended by service workers from across the country, it was the first chance for Nevada’s union members to size up the candidates alongside one another ahead of the state’s first-in-the-West caucus in February.

“This is definitely the starting ground for what we are looking forward to, and it definitely places everything on the stage for other candidates, what they need to look out for,” said Roxana Valladares, secretary-treasurer of SEIU Local 1107, in an interview after the event. “The candidates, when they come to Nevada and they want to win Nevada, they have to go through us. So they need to come and talk to us.”

Presidential candidates will need to curry favor with union workers here — whether with SEIU, one of the nation’s largest unions; the Culinary Union, the largest union in the state representing 57,000 hospitality workers on and off the Strip; or one of the other unions — over the next several months as they try to lock up support in an early nominating state where nearly 14 percent of residents are union members.

Read more: https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/in-union-town-democratic-presidential-hopefuls-court-support-from-major-labor-player