AOC Embarrasses Teamsters Chief After He Refuses to Endorse Harris

Teamsters President Sean O’Brien isn’t happy that Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez criticized the union for refusing to endorse Kamala Harris for president. On Thursday, in response to her comments, he made the spurious claim that the Teamsters in AOC’s district overwhelmingly support Donald Trump. 

Speaking to CNN’s Dana Bash, O’Brien said, “[Ocasio-Cortez] should maybe get into her district, where it voted far-right Republican, and maybe find out what the problem is.” 

Bash asked the union president what he meant, to which O’Brien responded, “In our polling, New York, her district, voted overwhelmingly Republican to support former President Trump, so she may want to focus on her job instead of mine.” 

While that sound bite was highlighted by the Trump campaign on X (formerly Twitter), O’Brien’s statement was quickly disproven by the fact that Teamsters Local 202 in New York’s 14th District in the Bronx endorsed Ocasio-Cortez Thursday, which the congresswoman was happy to post on X herself. 

O’Brien’s decision to withhold a presidential endorsement has been met with disapproval from Teamsters local chapters across the country, with several in key battleground states subsequently endorsing the Harris-Walz ticket. After the Teamsters president spoke at the Republican National Convention in July, rank-and-file members spoke from the Democratic National Convention stage to voice their support for Harris. The union’s National Black Caucus also voted unanimously to endorse the vice president.  

O’Brien signaled a possible endorsement for Harris after he criticized Donald Trump last month, calling the convicted felon’s remarks to Elon Musk about firing workers for striking and organizing “economic terrorism.” In the end, the Teamsters president has been left embarrassed not only by organized labor’s traditional allies in the Democratic Party but also by his own members.  

Senator Lindsey Graham hit the road this week, hoping to secure Nebraska’s five electoral votes for Donald Trump.

The South Carolina Republican met with Governor Jim Pillen and more than a dozen Republican lawmakers Wednesday with the hopes of shoring up support for a bill that would make all five of Nebraska’s electoral votes go to whoever wins the state, according to KOLN. 

Nebraska splits its five votes, granting two of them to the winner of the state’s popular vote, while the other three are given to the winner of the three congressional districts. 

Nebraska’s Republican congressional delegation wrote a letter to Pillen Wednesday urging the state to return to a model where all the votes would be granted to the winner of the whole state. Such a bill would transform Nebraska’s presidential election into a winner-take-all system—at the very last minute. 

This change has the potential to hurt Harris in the increasingly tight presidential race. Currently, she has a chance to pick up an electoral vote in Nebraska’s second congressional district, which includes the Democratic-leaning Omaha–Council Bluffs metropolitan area. If the law changes, then the state’s five votes will likely go to Trump. 

Graham’s concerted efforts to pick up extra votes for Trump on the path to 270 shows just how desperate the former president’s campaign has become, as Harris closes the gap in key battleground states. 

The longtime Trump ally seems perfectly aware of how badly things are going for the Republican nominee. He recently criticized Trump’s debate performance, calling it a “disaster,” and practically begged Trump to stop hanging out with right-wing conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer.  

The Uncommitted National Movement, an organization of Democrats who seek a cease-fire in Israel’s war in Gaza as well as an arms embargo against the country, announced Thursday that they will not be endorsing Kamala Harris.

In a statement, the organization said that “Vice President Harris’s unwillingness to shift on unconditional weapons policy or to even make a clear campaign statement in support of upholding existing human rights law has made it impossible for us to endorse her.”

But the organization added that they oppose “a Donald Trump presidency, whose agenda includes plans to accelerate the killing in Gaza while intensifying the suppression of anti-war organizing,” and that they wouldn’t recommend “a third-party vote in the presidential election, especially as third party votes in key swing states could help inadvertently deliver a Trump presidency given our country’s broken electoral college system.” 

The nonendorsement comes after Harris gave a boilerplate answer to a panel from the National Association of Black Journalists when asked about Israel’s brutal war on Gaza, which has killed over 41,000 Palestinians. The Democratic presidential nominee stuck to the talking points on her campaign website and didn’t offer any specific solutions or changes to existing U.S. policy.  

At the Democratic National Convention last month, the Uncommitted movement, which had 30 delegates at the convention, pushed unsuccessfully for an acknowledgment of the suffering and genocide taking place in Gaza on the main stage and asked the party to allow George state Representative Ruwa Romman to deliver a short speech. In the end, all they received was a panel on Palestinian human rights on the convention’s first day. 

Still, at that point, the organization held out hope that Harris would reach out, giving her until September 15 to meet with Palestinian American families in Michigan who lost family members to “U.S.-supplied bombs in Gaza and to discuss their demands for halting arms to Israel and securing a permanent ceasefire.”

That deadline came and went, prompting Thursday’s statement from the organization. Meanwhile, the Council on American Relations, in polling of Muslim American voters in the battleground states, has Green Party candidate Jill Stein leading Harris in Arizona, Michigan, and Wisconsin. While the Uncommitted movement didn’t endorse Stein, many of its supporters plan to vote for her, which could be a problem for Harris and the Democrats come November. 

The Teamsters’ International Union will not be endorsing either candidate for president this election cycle—but that doesn’t mean that the local chapters of the million-plus-member union will be taking the same stance.

On Thursday, several chapters of the Teamsters in key battleground states, including Wisconsin, Michigan, and Nevada, came out in support of Vice President Kamala Harris.

“The Harris-Walz ticket offers a comprehensive vision for America—one that not only prioritizes economic fairness but also stands steadfastly by our nation’s workers,” wrote Michigan Teamsters Joint Council 43 President Kevin Moore in a statement. “Their record and future plans are exactly what our country needs to continue growing and prospering.

“I urge all my Teamster members and fellow citizens to lend their support to this outstanding campaign,” Moore continued. “In conclusion, as a nation we must move forward to protect and grow the middle class. ‘We are not going back’!!!”

Groups in Nevada, California, Hawaii, and Guam also came out in support of Harris, representing a collective 300,000 Teamsters. In a campaign email celebrating the local endorsements, the Harris-Walz ticket acknowledged that Teamsters groups in several other states, including Florida, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania, had also backed the Democratic ticket.

Donald Trump, meanwhile, painted the national nonendorsement notice as a win for his campaign, telling reports after the fact that the nothingburger was “a great honor.”

“It’s a great honor,” Trump said during a stop in New York City, reported Fox News. “They’re not going to endorse the Democrats. That’s a big thing.”

Kamala Harris and Donald Trump are neck and neck in Pennsylvania, an essential swing state.

A Washington Post poll published Wednesday found that Harris is favored by 48 percent of likely and registered voters, while Trump is favored by 47 percent of likely and registered voters.

When third-party candidates are removed, the race becomes even closer, with Harris and Trump in a 47 percent matchup among likely voters, and Harris at 48 percent and Trump at 47 among registered voters.

Twice as many presidential debate watchers said that Harris won the face-off between the two candidates. Fifty-seven percent said that Harris had won, while only 27 percent said Trump. Seventeen percent thought that neither won.

The slim margin between Trump and Harris shows just how competitive this race has become, in a battleground state that was narrowly won the last two cycles: once by Trump in 2016 and then by Joe Biden in 2020.

Following Harris’s strong debate performance, a few other polls placed Harris ahead of Trump in Pennsylvania. The New York Times published a poll Thursday that found her in the lead by four points, at 50 percent, with Trump at 46 percent. A Quinnipiac poll released Wednesday found Harris was leading Trump 51 percent to 45 percent. A Franklin & Marshall College poll found that Harris was in the lead with 49 percent to Trump’s 46 percent.

For Harris, Pennsylvania is key to making it to the White House. If she loses Pennsylvania, she will have to win Georgia and North Carolina if she has any hope of making it to 270 electoral votes, according to Politico.

Trump’s campaign is focusing its energy on thwarting her advances in these three states. The former president has reportedly spent the most on advertising in Pennsylvania, hoping to secure voters in the pivotal state.

In that same vein, Trump has also picked a new town to harass with racist claims that it’s been overrun by Haitian immigrants, and it’s predictably in the battleground state of Pennsylvania. It seems the former president hopes to stir up some grievance-based votes and sow a little chaos along the way.