BY WALTER ELLIOTT
NEWARK / ELIZABETH – Five Academy Express shuttle bus drivers and their Newark Liberty International Airport passengers were surprised when Congressman and U.S. Senate candidate Andy Kim and Retail, Warehouse and Department Store Union leaders Charles N. Hall, Jr. and Stuart Appelbaum boarded first at Terminal B here.
Hall, of Maplewood-based Local 108, and Appelbaum, as union president from New York City, introduced Kim (D-Moorestown) as the RWDSU-endorsed candidate for Senate. Kim and his hosts just came from a roundtable discussion by the Newark-Elizabeth border with RWDSU shop stewards and members from several industries.
“We’re going to negotiate for you on Friday,” added Hall while he and the Kim party disembarked. He was referring to the talks with Academy Express for a new shuttle bus drivers contract that began on Oct. 11.
Local 108 had announced its support of Kim as early as the March 28 edition of “Local Talk.” That was when Kim was perhaps best known outside of his district for challenging the county line election ballot in federal court – which he won.
Kim the maverick became the Democratic Party front runner after winning the June 4 statewide primary. With RWDSU and growing support, Kim is ramping up his presence prior to the Nov. 5 General Election.
“I’ve been crisscrossing the state, making myself and what I stand for known,” said Kim after leaving the last shuttle bus. “There are some Democrats who are not happy with me about the ballot case, which is still in court.
The State Legislature, as of Oct. 15, has yet to bring a bill which will replace the county line voting format with block voting – as printed on the Essex County Nov. 5 ballot.
Kim is vying with six other party or independent candidates to succeed the resigned Bob Menendez as New Jersey’s junior Senator.
The married father of two had been visiting more Northern New Jersey cities since August, gathering endorsements and campaign funding along the way. His RWDSU roundtable at Twin City Supermarket that Wednesday morning.
Kim, flanked by Hall and Applebaum, fielded questions from union members at the supermarket’s second floor meeting room. About 25 union members, Kim’s support staff and media from “Local Talk,” NJ.com, WNYW Channel 5 and the “Philadelphia Inquirer” greeted him.
“Local Talk” figures that the room’s bar came with the building, which started life as Twin City Arena Skating rink in 1940 and rolled through 1988. “Twin City” was kept as the supermarket’s name after a group of grocers bought 1018 Sherman Ave., Elizabeth, in 1990.
The location, a half-block south of the Newark-Elizabeth border then as now, serves Newark’s Dayton neighborhood and North Elizabeth.
What started as a room for birthday and other private parties and a musician’s pre-concert prep room (think Grandmaster Flash and the Furious 5 or Peter Frampton) is now used by the supermarket for special occasions like on Oct. 9.
The 12 industry reps and/or shop stewards were active or retired supermarket cashiers, bus drivers, auto mechanics, civil servants and nursing workers. They were as near as Newark-Elizabeth and as far as Morris County. They asked Kim mostly about workplace and economic questions for 40 minutes.
A couple of speakers asked about high property taxes in context with inflation. One retired member said that he has to pay such taxes on his house, which is being repaired from a fire, and the rental apartment he has been living in.
Kim, on the federal level, said he favors repealing the $10,000 State And Local Taxes (SALT) cap that the Donald J. Trump Administration had set.
One speaker asked about the cost of child care. The congressman and senatorial candidate replied that he noticed the cost on his salary while his children were young. He said that he is working on a bill that would give a child care tax credit.
One of the closing speakers asked what he thought of the coarsening rhetoric between people, particularly while on the campaign trail.
“We have become a people addicted to rage,” said Kim, a second-generation South Korean-American. “One of the reasons why I’m running is that I don’t want my children growing up in that environment.”
The Philadelphia Inquirer Editorial Board, calling Kim “a clean break with the Garden State’s oftentimes transactional form of politics,” endorsed him Oct. 12. That plaudit follows Oct. 7’s endorsement by NJ.com.
Hall, while at Newark Airport, said that some union members are going door to door to get out the vote. They knock on doors, explain who they are, urging residents to vote on or before Nov. 5 and explain why they are endorsing Kim.
