LANSING – The Michigan AFL-CIO issued the following statement today commenting on news reports that Lt. Governor Brian Calley is planning to launch a campaign for governor.
“Rick Snyder, Brian Calley, and Bill Schuette all have one thing in common – they’ve all been terrible for Michigan’s working families,” said Ron Bieber, president of the Michigan AFL-CIO. “Republicans in Lansing have spent the past six years rigging the economy to work for their corporate campaign donors while regular working families struggle to make ends meet. As Lt. Governor, Calley cast the tie-breaking vote that gave corporations a $2 billion tax break, raised taxes on working families, and created a new Retirement Tax that devastated Michigan seniors. The last thing Michigan needs is a third term for Rick Snyder, and that’s exactly what Calley and Schuette represent.”
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LANSING – The Michigan AFL-CIO issued the following statement today to support campus employees at Central Michigan University, and oppose proposed job cuts:
“Laying off employees at CMU is a bad idea,” said Ron Bieber, president of the Michigan AFL-CIO. “Professors, instructors, faculty members, custodians, skilled trades, grounds and warehouse workers, electricians, HVAC and powerhouse workers are the ones who make CMU happen. Laying off workers and outsourcing these vital jobs would be bad for students, bad for faculty, and bad for the entire campus. It’s time for CMU to get serious about controlling spending and come up with real solutions to cut the deficit without cutting jobs that benefit the whole community.”
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LANSING – The Michigan AFL-CIO issued the following statement commenting on a new report that found that Michigan’s roads and bridges will continue to rapidly deteriorate in coming years:
“If anyone deserves the blame for Michigan’s unsafe roads and bridges, it’s Governor Snyder and Lansing Republicans,” said Ron Bieber, president of the Michigan AFL-CIO. “The roads package they passed two years ago made it more expensive to own a car by raising taxes and fees on working families, but didn’t require corporations to pay a single penny more to fix our crumbling infrastructure. That needs to change. If this report tells us anything, it’s that Michigan needs real solutions to fix our roads, not more gimmicks, and we can’t force regular families to shoulder the burden alone.”
LANSING – The Michigan AFL-CIO issued the following statement from Ron Bieber today commenting on new Republican legislation that would allow corporations to keep up to 100 percent of their employees’ income taxes to pay for new corporate tax breaks:
“This legislation is a raw deal for Michigan. The idea that a worker would pay their income taxes directly to their employer to subsidize their own salary is just nuts. This is really just another example of how Republicans are rigging the economy to favor their corporate donors over regular working people. Instead of giving more handouts to big corporations, we need both parties in Lansing to start working together to invest in education and infrastructure to build an economy that works for everyone, not just the wealthy.”
