A top labor union leader breathlessly praised President-elect Donald Trump for proving him wrong and showing that a Republican can champion the working class.
Dennis Daggett, the executive vice president of the International Longshoreman’s Association — the union that shut down ports with a strike earlier this year — said his recent meeting with Trump was “an experience I never imagined in my wildest dreams.”
“This man truly wants to fight for America and its working class. In over 25 years of working in Washington, I have never seen a Republican take up the mantle for working-class people. President-elect Trump proved me wrong yesterday,” Daggett wrote on Facebook. post.
“He didn’t just tell us in private that he supports workers — he made it clear to the whole world.”
Daggett had previously been guarded about his opinions on Trump. But the ILA has largely backed Democrats.
Daggett and his father, ILA president Harold Daggett, met with Trump last Thursday. They talked about the union’s deliberations with the US Maritime Alliance, which represents port operators, shipping lines and other key employers.
“It’s rare to meet a leader who truly listens, and even rarer to find one who is willing to act,” Daggett said.
“[Trump] was not just attentive to our concerns; he was receptive and genuinely engaged in a discussion about the existential threat automation poses — not only to the Longshore sector but to our communities and the very fabric of this great nation.”
Following that meeting, Trump took on one of their top grievances — automation.
“I’ve studied automation, and know just about everything there is to know about it,” Trump wrote on Truth Social after the meeting.
“The amount of money saved is nowhere near the distress, hurt, and harm it causes for American Workers, in this case, our Longshoremen. Foreign companies have made a fortune in the U.S. by giving them access to our markets.”
In October, ILA went on strike for about three days before reaching a temporary deal that extended contracts until Jan. 15, buying time for more negotiations.
That strike had spooked markets and raised concerns about supply chains getting snarled. It marked the first strike by the union in nearly five decades.
Negotiations had been stalled amid concerns about wages and automation.
Republicans have often been at odds with unions, skeptical that heavy-handed negotiating tactics on behalf of workers could harm job creation and the economy writ large.
However, under Trump, the Republican Party has made gains among working-class voters and shifted in a more protectionist direction when it comes to trade.
Trump had famously invited Teamsters boss Sean O’Brien to the Republican National Convention in July, marking the first time that the union’s leadership at spoken at the party’s marquee gathering.
In September, the Teamsters declined to endorse a Democrat in the presidential contest for the first time in nearly three decades.
Prior to doing so, the Teamsters released internal polling data showing that a majority of its rank-and-file members backed Trump. Several local Teamsters chapters endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris and Democrats seethed at the national leadership for the snub.
Trump also drew praise from labor in November by tapping Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-Ore.) as his pick for Secretary of the Department of Labor.
Chavez-DeRemer is the sole Republican lawmaker in the House to have sponsored the Protecting the Right to Organize Act, which bolstered benefits for workers joining unions and blunted some provisions in state right-to-work laws, which protect workers from being compelled to join a union.
