her local, knowing they would be fired for striking. She was subsequently elected to the executive boards of the San Antonio Central Labor Council and the Texas AFL-CIO. She was elected a vice president of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement in 1986. She was first elected an international vice president of AFSCME in 1988. In 1993, Chavez-Thompson became the first Hispanic woman elected to the Executive Council of the AFL-CIO. On March 1, 1995, she was elected executive director of AFSCME Texas Council 42, a statewide council of the union based in Austin with 12,000 members in 21 unions. AFL-CIO career Election Chavez-Thompson was elected executive vice-president of the AFL-CIO after John Sweeney ran for the presidency of the labor federation in 1995. The Sweeney campaign initially recruited Chavez-Thompson in May 1995 to serve as the AFL-CIO's secretary-treasurer. But a month later, Sweeney asked Richard Trumka to accept that position. Sweeney subsequently offered to create the post of executive vice-president and asked Chavez-Thompson to be his running mate for that position. During the ensuing campaign, Sweeney complained that supporters of Thomas R. Donahue, unfairly criticized Chavez-Thompson's qualifications for office. Donahue admittedly opposed creation of the position, but Donahue's supporters went further and claimed that "Sweeney's proposal to create a new leadership office for council member Linda Chavez-Thompson smacks of tokenism." In June 1995, AFL-CIO incumbent president Lane Kirkland resigned. Secretary-Treasurer Donahue was elected by the AFL-CIO Executive Council as his interim replacement at the regularly scheduled Executive Council meeting in early August. After his appointment, Donahue announced he would run for president of the labor federation in October 1995. In a gesture aimed at unionized women and clearly intended to defuse the excitement caused by Chavez-Thompson's candidacy, Donahue named Barbara Easterling, secretary-treasurer of the Communications Workers of America, as his choice for AFL-CIO secretary-treasurer. On August 1, 1995, Easterling was appointed by the AFL-CIO Executive Council to the position vacated by Donahue—making her the first woman to serve as an AFL-CIO officer (albeit an appointed officer). The creation of the office of executive vice-president at the AFL-CIO convention in October nearly did not happen. Donahue's supporters claimed that the office was created only to ensure Chavez-Thompson's election after Sweeney passed her over in favor of Trumka. They also opposed the new position because it would allegedly cost $500,000 a year to run and staff it. The charges proved