Teamsters will sit out of presidential election, but one Chicago-area local endorses Vice President Kamala Harris

After the 1.3 million member International Brotherhood of Teamsters announced Wednesday it would not make an endorsement in the presidential election, a Chicago-based joint council of Teamsters said its executive board would meet in the coming days to decide whether or not to make its own endorsement in the race, and one Chicago-area local endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris.

The Teamsters decision to forgo an endorsement is a break in tradition: the union has for years backed Democrats for president.

Before announcing its decision to sit out the election, the Teamsters released polling data that showed rank-and-file Teamsters supported President Joe Biden at 44.3% over former President Donald Trump at 36.3% in straw polls before Biden dropped out of the race. But following Biden’s departure from the race, electronic polling found Teamsters members voting nearly 60% for the union to endorse Trump over 34% who backed Harris. In polling following the presidential debate, Teamsters backed Trump at 58% and Harris at 31%, the union said.

On Wednesday, Park Ridge-based Local 727, which represents about 10,000 Teamsters including bus drivers and pharmacists, said it was endorsing Harris.

“I’m proud that our members care about the issues that matter most to all working people,” John Coli Jr., the local’s secretary-treasurer, said in a statement. Coli said straw polling conducted in May, before Biden dropped out of the race, showed “overwhelming” support for the Democrat from members of the local.

Pasquale Gianni, director of government affairs for Teamsters Joint Council 25 — an umbrella organization of Teamsters locals throughout Illinois and northwest Indiana — said members of the council’s executive board would meet in the coming days to decide whether or not to make its own endorsement. The Teamsters National Black Caucus has backed Harris as have some other Teamsters local organizations.

Gianni said that local polling data from the in-person town halls conducted before Biden dropped out of the race showed an expected “deeper blue tilt” in the Chicago area, with some downstate locals leaning toward Trump.

All in all, the Joint Council includes two dozen Teamsters locals which jointly represent around 100,000 members, Gianni said.

“Certainly, we’ll be listening to our membership,” Gianni said. “We’ll also be considering whose agenda will be better for our membership and better to uplift working people.”

The international union’s announcement not to endorse came after a meeting of the union’s executive board earlier Wednesday. The board met with Harris earlier in the week.

“Unfortunately, neither major candidate was able to make serious commitments to our union to ensure the interests of working people are always put before Big Business,” Teamsters President Sean O’Brien said in a statement.

“We sought commitments from both Trump and Harris not to interfere in critical union campaigns or core Teamsters industries—and to honor our members’ right to strike—but were unable to secure those pledges,” he said.

Most other major U.S. unions had already endorsed Biden before shifting their support to Harris. The Teamsters held back, in a move that has divided the union. O’Brien spoke at the Republican National Convention in July but not at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago last month; the union said he requested to speak at both conventions, according to The Associated Press.

Trump’s campaign heralded the non-endorsement as a win. Karoline Leavitt, Trump’s national press secretary, said in a statement that “the hardworking members of the Teamsters have been loud and clear— they want President Trump back in the White House!”

Bret Curlin, a shop steward with Teamsters Local 705 who has worked with the grassroots organization Teamsters Against Trump, said he was voting for Harris. Curlin, an assistant business agent with the union who has been a Teamster for 37 years, said labor was the main issue he looked at when deciding how to vote. Still, he felt it was the right thing to do for the union to officially sit out the election, saying he didn’t think an endorsement would make a major difference.

Curlin said that under Biden, he’d watched the National Labor Relations Board — which enforces labor law throughout the U.S. – become more aggressive and hopes a Harris administration would advance the cause of labor as he’s felt Biden’s has.

“With Trump it’s going backward,” he said. “My brothers and sisters don’t realize that.”