FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 9/26/94
FOR INFORMATION: JAN B. TUCKER, (818) 830-2794
LIZ CERVANTES-BARRON, (408) 287-4987

Peace and Freedom Party candidates Jan Tucker (State Treasurer)
and Elizabeth Cervantes-Barron (U.S. Senate) are charging that the
campaign of Senator Dianne Feinstein used Texas non-union printers who
pirated two separate union labels in criminal violation of the California
Labor Code and in violation of the Federal Trademark and Copyright Act.

Liz Barron, who is running for Feinstein's seat in the November
election, said that Feinstein has "an incredible amount of gaul to accuse
immigrants of taking jobs away from Californians when her own campaign
has been caught with its pants down sending jobs to Texas, to non-union
firms posing as union firms. Union printers throughout California should
be infuriated about this, as should all union members and all supporters
of immigrant rights." Barron, a lifelong Chicana movement and union
activist, also denounced what she called "Feinstein obvious hypochrisy in
supporting Proposition 187."

Jan Tucker, a licensed Private Investigator, initiated the
investigation into the bogus printing job when he received a fundraising
mailing from the Feinstein campaign. Tucker, who frequently investigates
the illegal use of union labels on behalf of District Council #2 of the
Graphic Communications International Union (GCIU), said that "I knew
there was something wrong with the mailing from the outset, because
neither the Allied Printing Trades Union Label on the outer envelope nor
the GCIU label on the inner contents had any identifying numbers to show
what printer had actually done the jobs."

Tucker accuses Feinstein campaign officials of stonewalling his
investigation from the beginning, and said that "when I finally got to
Kam Kuwata (Feinstein's campaign manager), he personally admitted to me
that they had learned that the use of the Allied Printing Trades Label
was bogus, claiming even they'd been deceived, but asserted that the GCIU
label was legitimate and the number had been omitted, because the
campaign didn't want the public to know that the printing had been done
in Texas.. That was bad enough, but as I persisted in my investigation,
it was ultimately exposed that the company which claimed to have a GCIU
contract was just as scab as the company that had used the Allied
Printing Trades Union Label.
GCIU Threatens Suit

According to Tucker, the Texas non-union firm, Paragon Printing
and Mailing of Austin, has been threatened with a lawsuit by Leonard E.
Adams, Vice President of the Graphic Communications International Union.
In a letter dated August 29, 1994 from Adams to Henry A. Despault of
Paragon, Adams asserted "The GCIU Label is the exclusive property of the
Graphic Communications International Union and it is registered and
copyrighted with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office of the U.S.
Department Of Commerce....Only employers who have signed a current
collective bargaining agreement with a Local of the GCIU and who have
also signed a current GCIU Label License Agreement are authorized to
reproduce this Label. Paragon Printing and Mailing obviously does not
meet these qualifications."
California Criminal Charges

Tucker, who says he made clear to the Feinstein campaign from the
start that his intention was to "put anybody who had anything to do with
pirating union labels in jail," is filing criminal charges of violation
of Section 1016 California Labor Code against the Feinstein campaign,
saying, "I got so much mis-information from them I'll have to let the
Labor Commissioner sort out who knew how much about this affair and when
did they know it. I don't think that any reasonable individual, in light
of what the truth was, will believe that the Feinstein campaign didn't
know that they were willfully using union labels in a manner not
authorized by the union, especially since they admitted that it was a
deliberate act not to use the identifying label number." Tucker also
indicated that he would bring California criminal charges with the office
of the State Labor Commissioner against the Texas firms involved, since
they knew that the mailing was to be sent to California.

______________________

return to the main page

The material included in this voter guide is archived and will not be updated. Please visit the California Voter Foundation's homepage for the most current information and resources.

© California Voter Foundation 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997 & 1998