It seems Josh Hawley lost the GOP battle over unions this Labor Day | Opinion

If Josh Hawley had his way, today — Labor Day — would be a big holiday in the Republican Party.

The Missouri senator has made a big bet the last few years that the future of the GOP really is, no kidding, a working class party that is friendly to unions, supportive of a social safety net and willing to bloody the nose of the billionaire class every now and again.

Republicans “must persuade a critical mass of working class voters that the GOP truly represents their interests and protects their culture,” he wrote for the Washington Post right after the 2022 midterm elections.

As should be apparent by now: Hawley isn’t getting his way.

It’s not just that Republican leaders aren’t going along, though they aren’t. President Donald Trump — who had Teamsters president Sean O’Brien speak at last year’s Republican National Convention, remember — has been on an anti-organized labor tear, dismissing worker-friendly members of the National Labor Relations Board and the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

So much for being the party of the working class.

Hawley’s longer-term problem, though, is that rank-and-file Republicans aren’t going along either. They positively hate unions.

Two new polls tell the story.

Gallup reported last week that GOP support for labor unions is plunging: Just 41% of Republican voters approve of unions, which puts the GOP at odds with the rest of the country. Two-thirds of Americans overall approve of unions, including 90% of Democrats and 69% of independents.

Pew Research Center reports similar news. Its polling finds that 62% of Americans think the decline of unions has been bad for working people, and 60% think that decline has been bad for the country.

“By contrast,” the polling service reported, “majorities of Republicans and GOP leaners continue to say that the decline in union membership has been good for the country (62%) and for working people (59%).”

OK, then.

Funny thing: Back in 2022 — when Hawley wrote his op-ed — GOP support for unions hit a record high in the Gallup poll: Fifty-six percent of Republicans liked the labor movement back then.

Which means that Hawley caught the wave right as it crested. Bad timing, that.

I’m sympathetic. Americans would be much better off if Hawley had proven correct, if the GOP really had the capacity to become a worker-friendly party.

That’s not in the cards, though.

Hawley is losing the battle. The GOP is the party of the bosses. Remember that as you celebrate this Labor Day.