What’s behind a union’s full-court press to take down BofA’s Kenneth Lewis?

[Omaha Steve]

My union AFSCME is in on this too.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30302758/

By Adam O’Daniel
updated 7:00 p.m. CT, Sun., April 19, 2009

A labor union’s drive to force changes at Bank of America Corp. will soon reach a boiling point. And some are beginning to question the motives behind the group’s barrage of advertisements and petitions.

The Service Employees International Union, an organization with more than 2 million members, and Change To Win Investment Group, a union pension fund that owns BofA shares, are making the BofA effort a top priority for the next two weeks. Union reps will appear on TV news shows and produce YouTube videos, circulate “fact sheets” on the bank, host petitions and protests outside bank offices and offer to make disgruntled BofA employees available to reporters to push their message.

And that message?

SEIU is collecting thousands of “taxpayer proxies” that call for BofA Chief Executive and Chairman Kenneth Lewis to be fired. Organizers plan to deliver them to BofA headquarters uptown on April 29 before the bank’s annual meeting that day.

“Taxpayers are now the biggest shareholders in the bank,” says SEIU executive Stephen Lerner, referring to the $45 billion in government capital on BofA’s books. “Every taxpayer should have the opportunity to vote.”

The group won’t disclose how much it is spending on the campaign.

The union is sponsoring a resolution at the annual meeting to have Lewis removed as the bank’s chairman. And it will likely stage protests outside the meeting.

FULL story at link.