Unions win fight to keep felons working at US ports

OpinionJournal - John Fund on the Trail:
"... clout of the unions who were able to gut the felon ban in the House-Senate conference committee. Sen. Daniel Inouye, a Hawaii Democrat, assured colleagues he would fight for the ban in conference but in reality fought to have it weakened. His staff even called Port of Charleston officials and told them their port would be shut down if the DeMint amendment became law."

US Rep. Jim DeMint (R-SC) deserves credit for trying to write into statute rules to prevent convicted felons from working at America's ports where there is a long-standing problem of smuggling drugs, weapons, illegal aliens, etc., as well as cargo theft. Giving the unions the benefit of the doubt, they probably don't want to perpetuate our vulnerability to terrorist penetration of our ports but they are unwilling to give up their longstanding lucrative sideline businesses of smuggling and theft.