House GOPers score labor endorsements in key swing NY districts: Moved to the right

Major unions are breaking from Big Labor in New York and backing GOP incumbents over Dem challengers in local tight House races — giving Republicans a better chance of keeping a majority in the chamber.The New York State AFL-CIO leadership is backing Democrats in all seven of the most competitive local House races — including five challenging first-term Republicans in swing districts — but that only tells part of the story.John Samuelsen, president of the 155,000 National Transport Workers Union who serves on the AFL-CIO Leadership Council, is backing the re-election of two embattled first-term Republican representatives in the Hudson Valley: Mike Lawler in the 17th District and Marc Molinaro in the 18th.Samuelsen emphasized that he backs Republicans as well as Democrats who are responsive to his members, who include mechanics, car cleaners, baggage handlers, bus and train operators, ramp agents and flight attendants.He said both of the Republican pols he’s supporting have proven they are allies of his members. “Democrats have to earn an endorsement.They don’t have an entitlement to a TWU endorsement,” Samuelsen said Sunday.Lawler has racked up 37 labor endorsements — 15 from law enforcement and 22 from construction and trades unions, including key affiliates of the 2.5 million member AFL-CIO, and from firefighters unions.He also won backing from unions representing carpenters, steamfitters, plumbers, electrical workers and operating engineers and the building and construction trades council.Many of the same unions or their locals backed Molinaro as well.“I think what you’re seeing within the rank and file of these unions is that the membership has moved to the right,” Lawler told The Post on Sunday while campaigning in Putnam County.“Certainly I think Republicans should be the party of working families and should be fighting for good paying jobs.”Lawler’s rival, ex-Democratic Congressman Mondaire Jones, has the backing of more than ...