Doug Thompson
Stephens Media

LITTLE ROCK — U.S. Sen. Blanche Lincoln said Monday she would oppose the Employee Free Choice Act pending in Congress.

“I cannot support the bill in its current form,” Lincoln said in a speech to the Little Rock Political Animals Club.

Even debating the so-called “card check” bill would take the focus away from righting the economy and molding health care reform, Lincoln said.

“The two groups we need at the table more than anybody right now are business and workers, and (card check) is keeping them apart,” Lincoln said. “It is divisive and distracting.”

The legislation, twice stopped by filibuster in the U.S. Senate after House approval, would give workers the option whether to form a union by a simple majority of signatures on cards or petitions or to hold a secret ballot. Under current law, employees file cards seeking union affiliation and employers have the right, almost always exercised, to defer the matter to a secret-ballot election.

Lincoln, facing what is expected to be a tough re-election campaign next year, has been pressured for weeks by both business and labor to take sides on the politically contentious issue.

A supporter of card check in the past, the senator has distanced herself from the measure, saying last month the issue “isn’t even on my radar” and that she had “no commitment to such a bill.”

She became the second senator who had voted to end a filibuster on card check previously to come out against it this time. U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, a Republican facing re-election, announced his opposition two weeks ago. Specter’s defection meant the requisite 60 votes to end a filibuster would be difficult if not impossible to achieve. Lincoln’s announcement solidifies the likelihood that the bill cannot go anywhere in the Senate.

Randy Zook, president and CEO of the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce-Associated Industries of Arkansas, said it was “gratifying” to see Lincoln come out against card check.

“We … appreciate how difficult of a choice this was for her to make, but with the unprecedented and extraordinary amount of opposition from the business and community leaders, we believe she made the right choice,” Zook said. “We believe that (card check) will meet the fate it deserves.”

Alan Hughes, president of the Arkansas AFL-CIO, said Lincoln’s decision was a disappointment to her working constituents. He said that 150 union supporters were rallying for the bill outside Lincoln’s office as he spoke. He said he doubted even one of those demonstrators deemed Lincoln a friend of the worker.

Republican Tim Griffin, a former U.S. attorney who has attacked Lincoln on the issue and is considering challenging her next year, said the senator’s comments Monday were not surprising given an erosion of Senate support for the measure.

“I’m glad that she is coming my way on this issue. I’m disappointed that it took years for her to get there,” said Griffin, who also wondered how the current form of the measure is different from the legislation Lincoln co-sponsored and voted for previously.

He said card check was among a range of issues that would determine whether he runs against Lincoln, including her support of the Obama administration’s stimulus package and whether she supports the president’s budget “which it is my understanding includes the largest tax increase in U.S. history.”

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Reporter Zack Stovall contributed to this report