Common Sense Weekly
Welcome to Common Sense Weekly! This is the Commonwealth Foundation's weekly news roundup of policy issues being debated in Harrisburg and across Pennsylvania.
Union political spending doesn't represent all their members
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters declined to endorse a presidential candidate, citing its members’ differing political views. However, the powerful union still writes checks to political campaigns that many members don’t support — and it’s not the only union disregarding its membership.
The Teamsters’ non-endorsement follows a straw poll showing about 60% of its rank-and-file members support former president Donald Trump. Union leadership was uncomfortable endorsing without “majority support for Vice President Harris” and “universal support for President Trump” — a telling double standard.
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Fracking could decide the election in Pennsylvania — and nationwide
Pennsylvania may be the deciding state in the 2024 election. And new polling from my organization makes clear energy may be the deciding issue for Pennsylvania voters
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Energy matters more to Pennsylvania — where polling shows Donald Trump and Kamala Harris tied — than almost any other state. Commonwealth Foundation President and CEO Andrew Lewis shares his thoughts on this story.
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New Poll Shows Pennsylvanians Are Concerned About Energy Affordability
A recent Commonwealth Foundation poll
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shows Pennsylvania residents are concerned about high energy costs and reliability.
The poll, conducted in September, used a sample of 800 state residents to create a representative sample. The poll asked questions about an array of national and state policy issues. Of particular note are the answers to the energy questions.
Energy is an important and often controversial issue. But this survey revealed broad agreement over the importance of energy affordability and reliability among respondents.
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Shapiro Gets ‘D’ For Fiscal Policy
When Democratic Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro signed a $47.6 billion budget this summer, he promised it was “cutting costs and reducing taxes”
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for residents.
Months later, he received a ‘D’ grade from the libertarian Cato Institute in its Fiscal Policy Report Card on America’s Governors.
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Six Republican governors received A grades while six Democrat governors – including Tim Walz of Minnesota, the party’s vice-presidential nominee – received F grades.
Scholars at the Washington, DC-based think tank took umbrage at Gov. Shapiro’s claim about not raising taxes.
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Unions should be about employees, not about politics
“I’ll be honest with you,” said
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Teamsters President Sean O’Brien in a recent podcast interview. “I’m a Democrat, but they have f—ed us over for the last 40 years.”
Wearing a T-shirt with “Teamsters vs. Everybody,” he accused Democrats of selling out “working people” in favor of “Big Tech.”
O’Brien’s rhetoric mirrors the feelings of Teamsters’ rank-and-file, which supports
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former President Trump
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over Vice President Harris by nearly 20 percentage points. The Teamsters
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and International Association of Fire Fighters
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, whose rightward leanings are admittedly less severe, declined to endorse either presidential candidate.
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Tell Gov. Shapiro to keep his campaign promises here
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!
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