Victor Kamber - The Kamber Group Years - USW/AFT Scandal

USW/AFT Scandal

In 1984, the United Steelworkers hired Kamber to direct several key organizing and collective bargaining campaigns.

Kamber subsequently was forced to take responsibility for a scandal which involved the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), another AFL-CIO affiliate. In February 1985, Albert Shanker, then president of the AFT, announced at a news conference his union had convinced the New York State Teachers Retirement System to withdraw $450 million from Manufacturers Hanover Trust Company because the bank had poorly administered workers' pension funds. Shanker also announced that the union had convinced the Pennsylvania School Employees' Retirement System to withdraw $300 million from the same bank, and that five other state teachers' retirement funds were expected to do the same. AFL-CIO officials said the AFT had convinced the retirement systems to withdraw the funds to protest loans Manufacturers Hanover had made to the Phelps Dodge mining corporation, which was involved in a bitter strike with the steelworkers.

Shanker was later forced to retract his statement. The pension fund deal had never existed, he said a few days later. The state retirement funds had withdrawn only $200 million from the bank. Shanker also admitted the fund withdrawals had been going on since mid-1984, and had nothing to do with the strike at Phelps Dodge.

Shanker angrily said that he had been "taken advantage of," and blamed Kamber. Kamber accepted responsibility, saying, "We're paid to take the blame, so we're at fault."