http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/us/politics/13nevada.html?_r=2&ref=politics&oref=slogin&oref=sloginBy STEVEN GREENHOUSE
Published: January 13, 2008
With Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama eager to win the Democratic caucuses in Nevada next Saturday, labor unions backing Mr. Obama are in a surprisingly intense, expensive fight with those supporting Mrs. Clinton.
Several pro-Clinton labor unions with small memberships in Nevada have thrown major resources into the state to counter pro-Obama unions with big memberships there. This has caused leaders of the pro-Obama unions to complain that one pro-Clinton union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, is bumping against the limits of the law by sending nearly 100 paid employees to Nevada to mobilize its roughly 3,000 members in the state.
Under federal rules, paid union campaign workers are limited to communicating with members of their own unions, although after their paid hours, they can, as volunteers, reach out to anyone.
Officials with two pro-Obama unions — the service employees with 17,500 members in Nevada, and the culinary union — questioned this week why the pro-Clinton union of state, county and municipal employees would need nearly 100 paid employees to work with just 3,000 union members.
“That would be the most intense member-to-member campaign I’ve heard of in the labor movement,” said D. Taylor, secretary-treasurer of Culinary Workers Local 226 in Las Vegas, a 60,000-member local — by far the state’s largest union — which endorsed Mr. Obama on Wednesday.
Larry Scanlon, the political director of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, said it made sense to have nearly 100 employees in Nevada because it is a large state, with much territory to cover. In addition, Mr. Scanlon said the paid political workers were needed to teach union members how the caucus process works. Only about 9,000 people participated in the 2004 caucuses, and the state’s Democratic Party is preparing for far higher numbers this year.
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