'Miami Model' of FTAA security is lightning rod JIM DEFEDE/COMMENTARY
Richard Trumka is not someone you want as an enemy.
A third-generation coal miner, Trumka was born in a small Pennsylvania coal town. While working the mines he went to law school at night and later led an upstart campaign to take over the mineworkers union. While president, he waged two bitter strikes against the state's largest coal operators.
Today, as secretary-treasurer of the national AFL-CIO, the 54-year-old Trumka is one of the most powerful men in organized labor and has made it his personal mission to settle the score with Miami city leaders and its police force for what happened during the Free Trade Area of the Americas summit last month.
''The American labor movement is committed, and I am personally committed, to see that the brutality we saw never happens again anywhere in this country,'' he said Tuesday during an AFL-CIO meeting to gather testimony from people who say they were abused by the police.