Rep. Gregg Johnson on building political power through people power

State Rep. Gregg Johnson is an AFSCME retiree and the former president of AFSCME Local 46 at East Moline Correctional Center. On Nov. 5, he won re-election to his seat as state representative from Illinois’ 87th District in the Quad Cities area. In his first term, he established himself as a strong advocate for organized labor and a defender of workers’ rights. 

How do AFSCME’s grassroots efforts help you and other pro-worker candidates like you win your races?

The PEOPLE program is very important. The Green Machine always does a great job on the ground. 

By the time I had started knocking doors for myself a few years ago, I had 25, 30 years of experience at knocking doors for other candidates [as an AFSCME member]. Going out there really affects races at the grassroots level.

I’ve turned that into a real strategy here locally. I’ve worked to help elect 12 school board members and two new AFSCME-endorsed mayors who are still currently in office. If you really want to build the lasting structure of an organization that can eventually lead you to the statehouse as it did for myself, it’s by building those relationships at that grassroots level. 

But more than anything, having validators out in the community—having people saying, I saw 15 AFSCME members, or I saw 45 union members knocking doors for this individual—it speaks volumes about that candidate’s merits. You reach voters at their doors.

How do your years of service as an AFSCME local president inform the decisions you make as a lawmaker?

[As a local president,] the first thing you do is make sure that one person is not the only one heard. I’ve always said the best executive board I’ve served under was during my first term, when we had a lot of close decisions. I learned that the important thing is, when you come out of these rooms, you come out as one unified voice. You learn a lot about how to lead, and at times, how to follow. It’s all about the team. It’s all about getting things done.

What are some pro-worker policies you’d like to advance in your next term?

Everybody gets really excited when they hear about workers organizing. But the most important thing is they have to get that first contract. We see a lot of very bad-faith bargaining. For AFSCME in particular, look at CGH Hospital in Sterling. For over three years now, they’ve not had that first contract. And it’s very clear to me that CGH will spend millions and millions of dollars to avoid that first contract and that structured union. I think we need legislation in Springfield that at some point forces some sort of arbitration, some sort of last-best-final offer, so these workers can then go forward with their collective bargaining rights.

We also have the two-tier pension system, which we know is inherently unfair. We’ve got to fix that.

Do you see any potential issues on the horizon that AFSCME members should be vigilant against?

We’re a week out from a recent election and I have some major concerns about organized labor, both private and public sector, with the incoming [Trump] administration. And I think that our members need to really become more vigilant than ever in looking at what people are doing out there.
More than anything, our members really need to understand that we are now in the fever-pitch battle, and we absolutely can’t sit on the sidelines. We should not be sitting out municipal elections. If you’re a state employee and you’ve got municipals coming up, you need to find out who is running that’s going to support your brothers and sisters in organized labor in these municipal elections. We should not take a cycle off. You can rest here and there, but when it’s election time, it’s go time. And we need to go every single year and get labor-friendly candidates elected all across the board.