Campaign 2008

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chatterbox: Gossip, speculation, and scuttlebutt about politics.

Whopper of the Week: Linda ChavezThe onetime labor secretary nominee elaborates on her affection for unions.

By Timothy Noah
Posted Thursday, Jan. 24, 2002, at 5:29 PM ET

"I think organized labor, I think quite mistakenly, somehow thought that I was going to be their worst nemesis. I had a very nice talk with John Sweeney this morning, by the way, and I don't think ... that would have been the case. I think I would have actually been very helpful in trying to bridge a gap that exists between the Republican Party and organized labor."

—Linda Chavez on CNN's Wolf Blitzer Reports, Jan. 9, 2001.

"My name is Linda Chavez. You may remember me as President George W. Bush's original choice for Secretary of Labor.

"Big Labor Bosses like the AFL-CIO's John Sweeney pulled out all the stops to defeat my nomination. After all, members of the media were calling me 'Big Labor's Worst Nightmare.'

"And they were right! I'm completely opposed to the special privileges given to Big Labor unions …powers that no other private organizations have. …

"AFL-CIO boss John Sweeney is an avowed Socialist, by his own admission.

"And he's put BILLIONS into pushing the Socialist agenda. …

"We can cripple liberal politics in this country by passing the Workers' Freedom of Choice Act.

"If we stop now, the terrorists win."

—Fund-raising letter for Stop Union Political Abuse, signed by its founder, Linda Chavez, sometime after Sept. 11, 2001.

(Thanks to Al Kamen's "In the Loop" column, Washington Post, Jan. 21, 2002.)

Got a whopper? Send it to . To be considered, an entry must be an unambiguously false statement paired with an unambiguous refutation, and both must be derived from some appropriately reliable public source. Preference will be given to newspapers and other documents that Chatterbox can link to online.

Whopper Archive:
Jan. 17, 2002: George W. Bush
Jan. 10, 2002: Simon & Schuster
Jan. 4, 2002: The Associated Press

(Click here to access the Whopper Archive for 2001.)