For Immediate Release
Tuesday, April 30, 1996
Vice President Gore, House Minority Leader Gephardt Vow Support for AFSCME's Legislative Priorities
Washington, DC —Vice President Al Gore, speaking before an enthusiastic audience of union activists at the Legislative Conference of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), AFL-CIO, today vowed strong support for legislative initiatives to safeguard key labor laws and protect vital workplace standards for public employees and other workers -- including working welfare recipients. Key issues addressed by the Vice President included welfare reform, Medicaid and Medicare, and the protection of labor standards.
“A worker is a worker is a worker,” Vice President Gore said of workfare participants who, under the new welfare law, must work in return for the aid they receive. Representatives of President Clinton’s administration have made it clear in the past that working welfare recipients should be paid at least the minimum wage and should be covered under the same workplace standards as other workers, including the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA).
In his remarks at the conference, AFSCME President Gerald W. McEntee said that workfare participants should be covered under the FLSA and OSHA, and should receive the federal minimum wage. But the AFSCME president added that welfare recipients, “should not be replacing public employees who are currently working. They (welfare recipients) should be provided with other good jobs.”
Vice President Gore also offered strong assurances regarding the privatization of welfare programs. While states await the outcome of Texas’ waiver request, McEntee and other top labor leaders have expressed concern that the Administration -- responding to pressure by Republican governors and conservatives in Congress -- will allow states to indiscriminately privatize their welfare programs. McEntee pointed out that some 14,000 state workers in Texas could lose their jobs if the waiver is approved. But Vice President Gore today recognized the value of public employees, and vowed to protect the interests of welfare recipients and the public employees who work to meet their needs.
“If the plan is not consistent with White House goals, we will not let the Texas proposal proceed,” the Vice President said.
On the issue of labor standards, the vice president reiterated that President Clinton would stand firm on issues of importance to workers. “You’re never going to see a bill get through the Administration that undermines labor law,” he said. “President Clinton will not sign any law that obliterates the 40-hour work week,” or compromises workplace standards.
House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt (D-MO), addressing the conference, said that steps must be taken to fix the welfare reform law so that it works for all Americans. He said he would introduce legislation that will help create jobs for the 2 million welfare recipients who will be required to work by the year 2002.
Both Vice President Gore and Rep. Gephardt spoke about the need to protect the nation’s Medicare and Medicaid programs, which provide health care coverage to the nation’s poor and elderly. “When it comes to Medicare,” Gephardt said, “We didn’t beat Bob Dole to put into place Bob Dole’s Medicare plan.”
