Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) Discusses Her Book at the AFL-CIO  ...1 of 3 >
May 2, 2014 - Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) spoke about her new book, A Fighting Chance (Metropolitan Books, April 22), at AFL-CIO headquarters.  Warren, a great favorite of progressives, continues to be the subject of 2016 presidential speculation in the media although she has repeatedly stated, "I am not running for president."
A large crowd turned out.  AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka cited progressives of all stripes, Netroots bloggers, leaders in the women's movement, environmentalists, civil rights leaders, community activists, members of the disability community, Wall Street activists, plenty of labor activists and others too numerous to mention.
Copies of Trumka's op-ed from this morning's Washington Post. were placed on chairs.  Meanwhile, on newsstands around town copies of the conservative Washington Examiner magazine feature a cover story asking "Are Unions Obsolete?"
AFL-CIO President Trumka opened his remarks stating, "We live in an age of radical inequality, made constantly worse by policies and ideas that seem to have momentum; they're driven by greed and by fear."  Trumka said working people will turn out "for leaders who reject the 1-percent and take a chance to fight for us, the typical working families; we'll turn out for those who give us a chance to earn a decent life from our labor, and we'll fight for those leaders." 

Trumka gave a glowing introduction of Sen. Warren, recounting:

"Now when I first met Elizabeth Warren she was a Harvard professor standing up to Wall Street with little more than the power of the pen.  She was the chair of an advisory oversight committee.  People said reform couldn't happen and yet, here we are today having passed financial reform with a powerful new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and Elizabeth Warren now sits in the hallowed Senate seat once occupied by Ted Kennedy...

"In a little more than a year she's written bi-partisan legislation to restore Glass-Steagall, to re-regulate banks, to challenge secrecy in our trade negotiations, and to advocate for young people in the fight against college loan debt peonage and for affordable higher education.  She's held the feet of bank regulators to the fire and, if the press is to [be] believed, she was a critical factor and actor in the appointment of Janet Yellin, the first woman to be the chair of the Federal Reserve."

And Trumka lauded Warren's book:

"A Fighting Chance is more than just another political book.  It tells the truth.  It's the kind of book that most politicians write after they retire or only allow it to be published after their demise.  See, in its pages Sen. Warren tells the truth about powerful people in both political parties and about the way our democracy has been subverted by the power of organized money.

"And at the same time it tells the story of an earlier Elizabeth Warren—not the people's champion, not the Harvard Law professor, but the middle-class, everywoman of the 1970s.  It tells her path from that time to this.  And when you read it, you'll understand where she gets her guts and where she gets her grit.  All of this is to say that A Fighting Chance is a book well worth reading, by a woman, quite frankly I could not be more proud to call my friend and my sister.  Our champion, Sen. Elizabeth Warren."
next >