Safaí, the labor candidate, working to shore up union backing
Mission Local is publishing campaign dispatches for each of the major contenders in the mayor’s race, alternating among candidates weekly until November. This week: Ahsha Safaí. Read earlier dispatches here.On Friday morning, Ahsha Safaí arrived at the San Francisco Labor Council’s pre-Labor Day breakfast at the InterContinental Hotel downtown at around 10 a.m. Safaí, who was eight years into a labor career when he first ran for public office in 2016 for District 11 supervisor, sat down next to Olga Miranda, the president of SEIU Local 87 and his former boss. Safaí knows Miranda well: He was the political director for Local 87, which represents janitors, from 2008 to 2016, working on signing up new members in non-unionized workplaces, organizing strikes, and pressuring politicians to support the union’s various campaigns, like involving custodians in talks when the city asked residents and downtown […]