Detroit News Reports Hoffa Faces Tough Re-election Drive

On Christmas day, the website of the DetNews.Com provided a lengthy report as to an uphill battle Hoffa faces in his re-election bid. The following is an exert of the report by Richard A. Ryan at the Detroit News...

Tyson Johnson, a Texas Teamster who has been an international vice president since 2000 and national freight director since 2003, announced last week in private meetings with union officials and in a curt letter to Hoffa that he is running for president. "I am declaring my candidacy for the General Presidency of this great union and many members of the General Executive Board and other Teamster leaders throughout the United States are joining me to form a slate in the 2006 election to return this union to the Teamster members," Johnson told Hoffa in his brief letter. The challenge to Hoffa's leadership from a member of his own executive board appears to shatter his oft-repeated insistence that the union is united. Richard Leebove, a Hoffa spokesman, said the Teamsters president would not personally respond to the latest challenge to his leadership. Read More at RoadDrivers.Org