MIKE CUNNINGHAM

Mike Cunningham’s incredibly hard work ethic and amazing capacity for detail rewired operations of the Texas Building Trades & Construction Trades Council over three four-year terms as Executive Director.

A close partner to the Texas AFL-CIO, Cunningham built solidarity, organized outreach and, through his modernization of the Building Trades communications program, added to the capacity of unions across the state, Cunningham’s winning battles at the Legislature against attacks on prevailing wages and attempts to hinder union growth made him a go-to lobbyist on the United Labor Legislative Committee.

In an excerpt on how immigration law affected the Building Trades, Cunningham testified before Congress and was quoted in major news publications on how employers were abusing immigrant work visas. His early alliance with the Workers Defense and his advocacy for immigrant workers were crucial components of the state labor federations’s expansion of immigrant worker programs.

Cunningham followed his father into the Heat and Frost Insulators Union, starting in Corpus Christi in 1972. He later became an apprenticeship instructor in Local 22 (Pasadena), leading to the presidency of the Houston/Gulf Coast Building & construction Trades Council. Among many resume items, Cunningham is in the Texas Labor Management Conference Hall of Fame and served on the board of the Texas AFL-CIO’s Workers Assistance Program.

Cunningham was married for more than 49 years to Lorraine Cunningham, who died tragically in a car collision. He has a son, three grandchildren and great-grandson.