January 26, 2012 – A small committee of SEIU Republican members from around California, including two members of Local 121RN, met this week to develop a political program to elect labor friendly Republican candidates to Local, State and Federal offices. In doing so, SEIU hopes to engage its Republican members to become more actively involved in labor’s legislative agenda. That agenda includes protecting the working class, access to healthcare, quality jobs and raising revenue to protect social services programs like In-home Supportive Services.

Karyn Elsenbach, an Emergency Room RN and 121RN member working at St. John’s Regional Medical Center in Oxnard, has volunteered to be 121RN’s representative to the Golden California Committee, and Jeannie King, 121RN Vice President and RN member at Pomona Valley Medical Center, will be the alternate representative to the committee.

King is enthusiastic about the formation of the Golden California Committee and that Republicans will now have an opportunity to be a part of the SEIU political process.

“Our main goal is to try to bridge the gap and encourage Republican legislators to support working people,” King said. “We have a long way to go, but we need to get Republicans to get over the stigma of embracing labor.”

According to information given at the initial Golden California meeting, 34.9 percent of registered Local 121RN members are registered as Republican. Overall, SEIU represents 700,000 members in California and about 21 percent are Republicans. Local 121RN was noted as having the highest percentage of registered Republicans out of the 12 SEIU locals in California. The second highest is Local 221 in the San Diego area with 28.8 percent.

Several of the official goals of SEIU California’s Golden California Committee include:

• Give Locals a statewide platform to engage Republican members.
• Elect fiscally realistic Republicans.

King says there are current candidates who describe themselves as being moderate Republicans. It is the intent of Golden California to identify these candidates and help them win in districts where there is a strong Republican base.

“We will support them in winning their campaigns if they will commit to working toward state budgets and policies that support workers,” King said.