AFL-CIO endorses Bermudez Zimmerman and Lamont

HARTFORD — The Connecticut AFL-CIO complicated the Democrats’ primary landscape on Friday, endorsing union organizer Eva Bermudez Zimmerman for lieutenant governor, despite Ned Lamont’s choice of Susan Bysiewicz for his running mate.

“We are organizers,” Bermudez Zimmerman said to a friendly reception from delegates gathered for the biennial nominating convention. “We are activists. This room is not filled with average people. This room is filled with extraordinary people that every single day fight the fight for the working class; every day reminding ourselves that the 1950s, the 1960s, that reality where you can have a job, buy a house, have three kids, put them through college, is a reality for everyone. Sadly, were going backwards.”

She exited to a standing ovation.

Lamont, who earlier this year emerged as the favorite in a straw poll among union members, easily won the union endorsement over Bridgeport Mayor Joe Ganim.

State Rep. William Tong, a candidate for attorney general who like Bysiewicz won the Democratic

Party’s endorsement during last month’s statewide convention, came three votes short of the two-thirds support needed among the 160 voting delegates, after being nominated by the union’s Committee on Political Education.

Eighty union locals were represented by 192 delegates gathered in the third-floor ballroom of the Hilton Hotel for the day-long event, which included panels of General Assembly members as well as pitches from candidates, including Bysiewicz, a former state lawmaker and secretary of the state, and Bermudez Zimmerman.

The 220,000-member AFL-CIO also endorsed Jahana Hayes, a former national teacher of the year, for the 5th Congressional District seat over Mary Glassman, a former Simsbury first selectman, who won the Democratic endorsement last month.

The convention had no endorsement for treasurer or attorney general, but the members have scheduled a post-primary session in late August to consider future support.

In Middletown on Friday prior to the union vote, Bysiewicz, in a joint news conference with Lamont, said she favors primaries.

“As the former secretary of the state, I can tell you more choices are good for the voters,” she said. “Ned and I were proud to be endorsed by the Democratic Party at our state convention in May, and we’re looking forward to bringing our message to the voters,” she said.

“Susan’s going to be a great lieutenant governor,” Lamont said.

“We’re going to be a team focused like a laser beam on creating jobs, helping Main Street businesses just like where we are right now, making sure this is a state where young people can stay, making sure small businesses have confidence to grow and invest.

“That’s what the primary is going to be about and that’s what our administration will be all about,” Lamont said.

Bermudez Zimmerman