This was done when Senator Clinton was up by 40 points in the polls.
http://www.afscmevotes.org/pages/endorsement_processOver the past 10 months, AFSCME has conducted the most exhaustive and intensive member-driven endorsement process ever organized by any union in the history of presidential politics. AFSCME members across the country have participated in the process. We sponsored candidate forums, met with the candidates, reviewed the candidates’ records and positions on the issues, and did extensive polling of AFSCME members nationally and in several key states.
AFSCME President Gerald W. McEntee said the ultimate goal of the process has been clear: “We have the most talented and diverse field of candidates in years, giving us a historic opportunity to elect a candidate who will fight for working families. Our endorsement decision will hinge on the candidate’s record, position on the issues, the viability of their campaign, and their ability to inspire and motivate our members.”
Included in AFSCME’s endorsement process were these events and activities:
* We created a Presidential Search Committee to reach out to the candidates and their campaigns, in both parties, to determine who had the best record of support for working families, who had the best program for the future and who would be the most effective candidate in the 2008 general election campaign. In recent months, all of the major Democratic candidates and their campaign staffs met with the AFSCME Presidential Search Committee. Not one Republican candidate has completed the AFSCME candidate questionnaire nor requested an interview with the committee.
* AFSCME hosted the first candidate forum of the 2008 campaign, nationally televised from Carson City, Nevada, in February, where members were able to see the candidates in action and ask questions of importance to working families.
* In June, AFSCME hosted a second nationally televised candidate forum during our National Leadership Conference in Washington, D.C., where 2,000 AFSCME leaders and activists from across the country were able to hear first-hand from the candidates.
* More than 1.6 million active members and retirees received by mail a summary of the candidates’ responses to a detailed questionnaire on issues that matter to AFSCME members, including retirement security, health care and protecting public services.
* Thousands of members throughout the country participated in meetings with local and national leaders to discuss the 2008 election. Many met with candidates who came to their conventions and meetings, spoke at rallies and marched on picket lines.
Members throughout the country were surveyed regularly on their candidate preferences through scientific, representative phone calls. In recent weeks, in a first for any union, more than 850,000 AFSCME households were surveyed and asked to express their support for the candidate of their choice. Senator Hillary Clinton was the overwhelming choice of AFSCME’s membership in every survey and phone poll -- nationally and in targeted states.