The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) spent $61 million on political activities and lobbying in 2016, as well as an additional $19 million on the Fight for $15 movement. Now that spending is leading to massive layoffs.
The powerful union’s most recent Department of Labor filings revealed that the union spent $61.6 million, or about 20 percent of its $314.6 million budget, on political activities, including Hillary Clinton’s failed 2016 presidential campaign, according to Bill McMorris of the Washington Free Beacon.
While the union picked up a modest 15,000 new members in 2016, it has seen revenues fall, leading to staff layoffs inside its Washington, D.C. headquarters, according to the report.
According to McMorris, the $61.6 million figure was $13 million higher than what was spent in 2014, but $51 million less than what the union spent during former President Barack Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign.
