Pennsylvania Democrats push to counter Trump’s growing rise with union workers

Bushy-bearded United Auto Workers leader Dan Vicente has watched first-hand as his fellow union workers have drifted away from the Democratic Party here in Pennsylvania.

Bushy-bearded United Auto Workers leader Dan Vicente has watched first-hand as his fellow union workers have drifted away from the Democratic Party here in Pennsylvania. He was almost one of them. The plain-spoken UAW Region 9 director told a bustling hall on Sunday that he nearly voted for Donald Trump in 2016. Now, two elections later, Vicente said he’s still “not super into” either party but is backing Kamala Harris because she “at least comes from the working class.” But he worries that Trump is still the one breaking through in many union shops like his. “Let’s be real, a huge number of our unionized members are going to vote for Trump,” Vicente told CNN at the pro-Democrat rally. “The national Dems have a real problem with messaging to regular working people. You can give all the policy speeches you want. Nobody’s listening.” The labor leader’s warning is yet another alarm bell for Democrats about their clout with labor nationally, which has been slipping for decades, according to interviews with more than a dozen union workers and local Democrats. Trump’s strength in places like eastern Pennsylvania have made it a far more urgent problem for Harris, whose ability to win the White House could come down to a few thousand votes here in the state.