Cops and firefighters voted overwhelmingly for Republicans in Iowa and are now shocked—shocked!—to learn that Republicans are anti-union. The latest attempt to destroy public sector unions exempts public safety employees, but that isn’t mollifying anyone:
Hundreds of helmeted firefighters have flooded the Statehouse in the last week and police officers and sheriffs have lined up at committee hearings to speak against it. They don’t trust that this carve-out for their jobs will last long, nor do many of them feel it’s appropriate to deny the bargaining rights they have to fellow workers who have also had them for over 40 years.
….That has many police officer, who voted for Republicans in large numbers this year, particularly upset. “It’s collective begging, that’s what it is,” Thomas labeled the bill at a subcommittee hearing. “Half of law enforcement folks I work with are Republicans. And we voted for Republicans because of conservative values. But we didn’t vote for Republicans to get stabbed in the back while we’re trying to dodge cars and bullets.”
It’s not exactly a well-kept secret that Republicans have spent the last hundred years opposed to unions, and the last 30 or 40 actively trying to destroy public-sector unions. What did these guys expect? Do their union leaders do anything at all other than issue bulletins whenever some Black Lives Matter protester says something they don’t like?
