Leon Lynch has served six terms as the USW’s International Vice President for Human Affairs. He was appointed to that post when it was created by the 18th Constitutional Convention in 1976 and was elected in 1977 and reelected in 1981, 1985, 1989, 1993, 1997, and again in 2001.

Lynch joined USW Local 1011 in 1956 at the Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. mill in East Chicago, Indiana, and served on many local committees and as president of the YS&T federal credit union. He was named a staff representative in 1968 and an international representative in 1973.

As Vice President, Lynch oversees the USW’s civil rights and human rights efforts. He also chairs the Container Industry Conference and handles the negotiations for Rexam, Crown Cork & Seal and Silgan Containers. He also chairs the Public Employees Conference, International Constitution Committee, and is chairman of the Steelworkers Health and Welfare Fund.

Lynch was elected in October 1995 to the AFL-CIO Executive Council. He frequently represents the USW and the AFL-CIO at conferences of the International Labor Organization and in international labor matters.

Active in many political and human rights organizations, Lynch is a member of the executive committee of the Democratic National Committee, chair of the A. Philip Randolph Institute, president of the Workers Defense League, a board member of the National Endowment for Democracy, and a member of the Labor Roundtable of the National Black Caucus of State Legislators.

He was appointed by President Clinton to the Advisory Council on Unemployment Compensation in 1994.

In December 2000 he was appointed by President Clinton to the Air Traffic Service Board of the Federal Aviation Administration