But a new report from the Center for Working-Class Politics looks at a surprisingly simple way that ordinary people might have more influence in our political system: run more union members for office. In fact, we found that union candidates invoked pro-worker themes 159% more than their non-union candidates. Unfortunately, we also find that union candidates are too few and far between. In 2022, just 55 union candidates ran out of 1,200 total, and many of those had only weak ties or short tenures with unions. Like working-class candidates more broadly, most union candidates don’t have any way to support themselves while campaigning.

Source: The Guardian March 11, 2026 12:01 UTC