For Immediate Release
September 10, 2004

Over 50,000 Attend “Reinvest In America/Put America Back to Work!” Rally & Concert in Charleston, West Virginia

Artists and Speakers Entertain, Challenge and Inspire

Rev. Jesse Jackson, Danny Glover, Willie Nelson Bring Jobs, Healthcare, Education to Center Stage in Presidential Race

Charlesto, W.Va. (September 8, 2004) It will be remembered as one of the largest rallies ever in this capital city, located in the heart of economically battered Appalachia.

They sat on the riverbanks, in metal bleachers and on lawn chairs; they stood in the windows of nearby buildings or on the decks of parking garages. What brought them here was an 11-hour mix of music and politics during which some of the nation’s leading popular musicians joined Rev. Jesse Jackson, actor Danny Glover, and country music legend Willie Nelson onstage to focus attention on the urgent issues affecting residents in this region as well as all Americans: jobs, healthcare and education.

On Labor Day, Sept. 4, 2004, more than 50,000 people came together in downtown Charleston, WV on the banks of the Kanawha River to attend the “Reinvest in America/Put America Back to Work!” rally and concert.

Co-sponsored by the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, Kanawha Valley Labor Council, the United Mineworkers of America (UMWA), the United Steelworkers of America (USWA), the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), and several other labor unions, “Reinvest in America” has assumed major significance in the presidential race by highlighting the worsening the plight of working families in the Appalachian region of Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia.

Political, civil-rights, labor, religious and business leaders shared the stage with entertainers. All expressed the frustration of seeing economic and living conditions worsen throughout the Bush presidency: plants closing; workers losing their hard earned healthcare benefits; children going to underfunded schools.

Entertainers including Nelson, Judy Collins, Nanci Griffith, Asleep at the Wheel, and the Indigo Girls mixed criticism of the president’s domestic leadership and foreign policy with their musical performances.

Three Texans--Griffith, Nelson and Asleep at the Wheel’s Ray Benson--spoke for those who support their state but not its most famous son.

“We are Texans not supporting George Bush,” Benson told the cheering crowd. “We play country music. Some use it to divide the people and as a flag-waving symbol for an immoral war. I want y’all to know there are millions of people hip to this -- and millions of people who want George Bush to return to Texas.”

In a news conference held during the rally, labor leaders decried the loss of jobs throughout the region and nationwide. As dozens of steel and coal mines have closed in recent years, destroying the union workforce, non-union retail giant Wal-Mart--known for low wages, skimpy health care benefits and cutthroat competition--has become West Virginia’s largest employer.

American workers are humiliated as well as victimized when jobs go overseas, charged Warren Mart, general secretary of the International Association of Machinists. To outsource as cheaply as possible, corporations often force American workers to break down equipment in the U.S. for shipment overseas. And on foreign soil, Americans train new workers earning about one-eighth of what U.S. workers made.

“The people who made the most money were the CEOs who exported the jobs,” Rev. Jackson said. “They did not reinvest in America.”

Healthcare is a life-and-death issue--especially when employment-based insurance coverage disappears with jobs. With news of former president Clinton’s heart disease in the headlines, speakers noted that adequate health insurance allowed the detection of his illness.

“So many people don’t have the healthcare that I have, that President Clinton has,” Collins said. “It’s a privilege to work, but it should not be a privilege to have healthcare, to have a job, and for every vote to count.”

Griffith said she plans to send the pile of medical bills facing her uninsured niece, who has cancer, to California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. Griffith also told of her ill cousin who, after job loss and divorce cost her health coverage, was refused treatment at a hospital until relatives scraped together enough money to start paying.

“In Appalachia, a coal miner dies every six hours from black lung disease,” Rev. Jackson said. “Poor folks with no health insurance don’t get early detection. … The effect of this unfair, unequal access to healthcare impacts the whole family.”

And a family without adequate healthcare, Rev. Jackson added, is unlikely to cope well with an educational system that requires children in some parts of West Virginia to travel 2 hours to school – truly the children who will be “left behind.”

“Reinvest in America” was held, Rev. Jackson said, to bring attention to the plight of working people in a presidential campaign already deep in divisive “wedge issues” and “mudslinging” around guns, gays and God.

Rev. Jackson drew an enthusiastic response by faulting Schwarzenegger’s insensitive comments about working Americans, whom he characterized as “girly men.”

“Are those who work – our coal miners, our steel and farmworkers - girly men?” Rev. Jackson asked.

“No!” the crowd yelled in response.

“The contempt shown for working people must be rejected,” Rev. Jackson said. “These are real people, real workers, real dreamers, and they have paid their dues. They work every day. Any sound economic plan must include evening the playing field. The American worker is disenfranchised because of an uneven playing field.”

Nelson, a longtime supporter of rural Americans through Farm Aid, said he joined “Reinvest in America” because he believes artists can and must bring attention to the needs of the nation’s working poor and help change the course of the country.

“A lot of politicians can’t draw as many people as Asleep at the Wheel,” Nelson said.

Glover said the gathering of the artists, labor leaders, politicians and civil rights leaders reminded him of the mobilization that occurred during the Populist era.

“We need to do it now more than ever, because we are all in the same boat,” the actor said. “We have to fight for jobs, healthcare and a better future for our children.”

Contact: George Korn
740-953-1130
korn@ohio.edu