Home Health Aides Test Political Influence in Georgia

ANCOR is sharing this Politico story because of parallels between the Direct Support Professional (DSP) workforce and the Home Health Aide (HHA) workforce, making us generally interested in monitoring examples of the workforce becoming involved in advocacy and campaigns.

“The country’s fastest growing sector of workers is mobilizing as a political force for the first time by rallying behind Georgia Democrat Stacey Abrams’ bid to become the first black woman governor in the United States.

The National Domestic Workers Alliance claims a membership of more than 2.5 million home health aides, nannies and housekeepers and has ambitions of one day matching the political footprint of labor unions that have long been a pillar of the Democratic Party. Leaders of the group see a logical ally in Abrams, who has championed expanding Medicaid, raising the minimum wage and strengthening funding for rural health care.

[…]

Abrams is locked in a tight race against Republican Secretary of State Brian Kemp. Since she won the Democratic primary this spring, about 100 domestic workers with the NDWA-affiliated group Care In Action have fanned out across Georgia to knock on doors and hold get-out-the-vote events. The group is buying hundreds of thousands of dollars of radio and digital ads backing Abrams and a handful of down-ballot Democrats.

[…]

Nevada has provided a test case for how a workforce of low-income women of color can jolt state politics. There, unionized hotel workers have emerged as a political force, and a major factor behind Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto‘s victory in 2016.”