MADISON, Wis. – Twice the number of signatures needed to force a recall election of anti-union Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker were delivered to state election officials Jan. 17.
State officials told The New York Times that the number of signatures submitted in the petition drive is ”so large as to put any serious legal challenge out of reach.” Some 540,000 signatures were needed to force a recall election to unseat Walker, and the one-million-plus signatures surprised even ardent supporters of the petition drive who expected only 720,000 signatures.
Additional signed petitions – also topping, significantly, the number required — were delivered in an effort to force recall elections of Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch and four Republican state senators, including the state senate majority leader, all of whom have been allies of Walker in anti-union legislative actions.
The signed petitions were delivered in boxes to the State Capitol in Madison in a caravan of trucks.
Organized labor – with considerable assistance from the UTU Collective Bargaining Defense Fund – expended considerable effort obtaining the signatures. This followed yeoman work earlier in the year engineering a recall of two Wisconsin state senators who plotted to eliminate collective bargaining rights for state workers.
Gov. Walker was the architect of the Wisconsin assault on collective bargaining rights. A successful recall of Walker could stop dead in its tracks further efforts by anti-labor zealots — nationwide and in Congress — to attack the fundamental rights of working Americans to organize and bargain collectively.
When the recall election dates are assured, UTU Collective Bargaining Defense Fund activities in Wisconsin — coordinated by UTU State Legislative Director Tim Deneen — will be directed at organizing rallies, engaging in door-to-door canvassing of voters, operating phone banks, sending letters to the editor, and meetings with media editorial boards to generate a get-out-the-vote push to give Gov. Walker and his political allies their walking papers.
For more information on the UTU Collective Bargaining Defense Fund, click on the following link:
https://www.smart-union.org/collective-bargaining-defense-fund/
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