AFGE President Everett Kelley on Feb. 13 was honored with the World Peace Prize for Labor Leadership from the World Peace Prize Awarding Council (WPPAC) for his exceptional and inspiring leadership and a lifetime of dedication to the cause of labor. With this award, Kelley became the first male recipient of all three awards from WPPC.
WPPAC consists of 14-member Board of International and Interfaith judges. The board is comprised of representatives of the world’s nine major religions: Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Catholicism, Protestantism, Russian Orthodox, and Zoroastrianism.
Kelley, a native of Alabama and a Baptist Minister, first received the Roving Ambassador for Peace Prize from WPPAC in 2019 for his tireless work promoting workers’ rights and social justice. He was AFGE’s national secretary-treasurer then. In 2023, he was honored with the Richard Trumka Word Peace Prize for Solidarity. The late AFL-CIO president helped launch the World Peace Prize throughout the American organized labor, and the World Peace Prize for Solidarity was renamed in his memory.
Speaking at the award ceremony in Washington, D.C., Father Sean McManus, president of the Irish National Caucus and chief judge of the WPPAC, said Kelley is the man of justice and solidarity. He understands the linking of labor and world peace, and this understanding is very important.
“Without social justice, there is no love. Faith must do justice,” he said.
Kelley said he was honored and humbled to receive the award and to be the first male recipient of all three WPPAC awards. He said AFGE is engaged every day in the face of conflicts and injustice. As a labor leader, he understands those struggles.
“We have to lift our voice to be the voice of the voiceless,” he said. “We have to stand together to pave for peace and dignity.”
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