Dear john,

Can you believe it’s October already? We love to go all out for Halloween, but this year we’re focused on preventing the scariest thing of all: another Trump presidency.

Read on to find out how you can help us do just that.

Texas Labor stands in solidarity with striking ILA workers. At midnight, 45,000 longshoremen in the International Longshoremen’s Association went on strike at 36 ports across the East and Gulf Coasts, including the Port of Houston here in Texas. Longshoremen keep our economy running. It’s far past time they share in the billions of dollars in profits resulting from their labor. We call on the U.S. Maritime Association to negotiate in good faith toward a fair contract.

You have less than a week to register to vote! We may sound like a broken record at this point, but the stakes of this election are sky-high. That means we need to make ALL our voices heard at the ballot box on November 5th to elect candidates who will fight for working Texans. Head to our Election Resources page to check your registration.

Registering for the first time? Click HERE to get all the info you need.

Remember: You cannot register to vote online in Texas. Before the October 7th registration deadline, you must either:

• Print, fill out, and mail your voter registration form to your county’s elections office OR

• Print, fill out, and deliver your voter registration form to them in person OR

• Go to your county’s elections office and fill out the voter registration form there

Let’s get started!

Our vote is our voice, and Texas Labor will be heard in November!

Our union brother Tim Walz will take on billionaire puppet J.D. Vance in tonight’s VP debate. J.D. Vance may claim to support the working class, but his actions speak louder than his words. He’s spent his less than two years in the Senate catering to corporations and the wealthy at the expense of working people. He hasn’t supported the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, and introduced a bill that would weaken unions and strip away workers' rights by letting companies create their own sham unions. He even weakened his own rail safety bill to appease corporate lobbyists!

We don’t have to predict what he and Trump would do in the White House. They support Project 2025, the extreme right-wing policy agenda that would get rid of all public sector unions, enable corporations to get away with illegal behavior that hurts workers, and gut worker protections by defunding the NLRB and OSHA. You can see the full breadth of how Project 2025 would hurt workers on our Election Resources page.

Governor Walz, on the other hand, has a lifelong track record of fighting for workers. That’s why he was endorsed by the AFL-CIO as soon as Vice President Harris chose him as her running mate. As Governor of Minnesota, he enacted a slate of pro-worker legislation, including a ban on captive audience meetings and noncompete agreements, expansion of teachers’ bargaining power, and free breakfast and lunch for school children.

With billionaires lining up behind Donald Trump and J.D. Vance and pouring money into our state elections to elect anti-labor candidates up and down the ballot, the stakes couldn’t be higher — and we need your help.

We’re activating thousands of union members across the state to talk to voters in union households and get out the vote for candidates who will fight for working Texans, from the state house to the White House. Across the state, our local labor bodies and affiliates are hosting phone banks, text banks, and block walks every week from now until the election. They need our help to reach members – will you join us?

In Solidarity,

Team Texas AFL-CIO