Why is Bernie Sanders tweeting about Philippine trade unions in his 2020 US election campaign?
- The senator has accused the Philippine government of carrying out an ‘abhorrent’ crackdown on activists and labour groups
- Is it a genuine sign of support for Philippine unionists or an attempt to court 3.4 million Filipino-Americans?
They were reacting to a Twitter post from the 77-year-old senator from Vermont that said: “In recent years, we have seen abhorrent human rights abuses by the Philippine government. This repression of trade unionists is a shameful attempt to silence people’s rights and freedoms. More than ever, we must stand on the side of global human rights.”
The “repression” referred to a series of nighttime arrests on October 31 against 57 members of labour and civil society groups in the Philippines.
The Brussels-based International Trade Union Confederation issued a statement condemning this “new wave of police repression of Philippine trade unionists”, which Sanders soon picked up and denounced as well.
His tweet had barely trended when Presidential Communications Operations Office secretary Martin Andanar criticised it. He accused Sanders of “grandstanding on an issue he obviously does not know the details of, not to mention meddling in our national affairs, which he has no business over”.