Historically, labor unions in this country have opposed high levels of immigration for the very obvious reason that the importation of large numbers of non-unionized foreigners takes jobs and depresses wages. In a Breitbart News article published yesterday, John Binder looks at how times have changed.
Binder quotes United Auto Workers’ chief Shawn Fain telling Axios about illegal aliens: “They’re not invading our nation. They’re human beings.”
The fact that they can be both seems elusive to Fain. That kind of mushy thinking is more suitable to childless cat ladies, SJWs, and elementary school principals than tough-minded labor leaders, but that’s where we are today. Labor leaders like Fain seem to think that being a “human being” — of a certain non-traditional-American stripe, mind you — gives you a license to go live where you like, whether the locals and rank-and-file union members like it or not.
It’s not clear how this air-headed mushiness can be reconciled with the undeniably negative impacts of wide-open immigration on organized labor. (Binder cites the late Cornell labor economist Vernon Briggs Jr., who painstakingly examined the issue in detail.) But the simple fact is the modern Left requires no such reconciliation. It’s as though by rejecting logic they think they have created a new super power, which enables them to hold any number of contradictory ideas simultaneously. Their goal is to impress their listeners with their sanctimonious assertion of moral superiority, rather than persuade through hard-headed arguments on behalf of their members.
Face it, workers: today’s labor leadership has thrown in with the corporate elites and far-left ideologues. Like Orwell’s pigs in Animal Farm, they’ve learned to walk on their hind legs, and more and more they resemble the farmers they revile.
For more, see Breitbart News.