LAS VEGAS — The tight race between Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama has opened surprisingly deep and bitter divisions in the ranks of organized labor, as rival union leaders fly planeloads of last-minute volunteers into key states, accuse each other of trying to disenfranchise members, and even launch open attacks on rival Democratic candidates.
In Nevada, which holds its caucuses Saturday, unions backing Clinton are crying foul because some caucuses will be in casinos and hotels where a pro-Obama union's members predominate -- helping that union's members and potentially discouraging others.
Meanwhile, inside the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which has endorsed the New York senator and is leading the charge for her in Nevada, several officers are protesting the union's decision to run negative ads against the Illinois senator.
"This race has taken on more intensity than we have seen in the past," said Karen Ackerman, AFL-CIO political director and a veteran of numerous presidential campaigns. Other union leaders lament the vitriolic conflicts they say are developing between unions and worry that the effects could linger into the November campaign.
Organized labor is probably the single-most important part of the Democratic Party's election machinery, providing thousand of campaign workers and millions of dollars for sophisticated get-out-the-vote efforts and others. Though unions have divided over presidential candidates in the past, labor insiders say the closeness of the Clinton-Obama race has made this year's divisions unusually bitter.
It has also made the process much more expensive and thus raised the stakes for union leaders and their members.
Many labor leaders, including Ackerman, say this year's competition is healthy, a sign of how badly Democrats want to retake the White House. They predict unions' support for the Democratic nominee will be all the stronger in November.
That may prove true.
Democrats' hostility toward the Bush administration is a powerful force for unity. But pre-nomination splits have not always healed. In 1980, when Sen. Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts challenged President Carter for the party's nomination, the split contributed to Ronald Reagan's victory. And Richard Nixon defeated Hubert Humphrey after Democrats split over the Vietnam War.
