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Former U.S. President and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump attends a 2024 presidential election campaign event in Summerville, South Carolina.
Trump makes his Michigan pitch
As autoworkers walk picket lines in 21 states, President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are both in Michigan, the heart of the American auto industry, trying to woo union workers. Both men hope to win support from voters in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, three states with large numbers of union members that proved decisive in both the 2016 election of Trump and the 2020 election of Biden. That’s where the similarity in their messages ends.
On Tuesday, Biden told members of the United Auto Workers, a powerful labor union, that he stands with them in their fight with automakers for better pay and working conditions. This evening in a Detroit suburb, Trump will tell union members that Biden is lying to them about their true enemy: It’s not their employers who are cheating them but the leaders of their unions, who are in league with woke liberals and a fake environmental agenda that will kill their jobs, allowing foreign countries (mainly China) to take advantage of America and its workers.
Meanwhile, 2,300 miles away in Simi Valley, California, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, former Vice President Mike Pence, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, and North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum will debate before the diminishing number of Republican voters still looking for a Trump GOP alternative. The debate begins Wednesday at 9 p.m. ET and will air live on the FOX Business and Univision cable networks.Striking United Auto Workers members picket outside the Stellantis Jeep Plant in Toledo, Ohio.
Autoworkers’ strike highlights Biden’s union problem ahead of 2024 vote
Bad news for US President Joe Biden: as the United Auto Workers’ strike enters its fifth day, labor and climate priorities are colliding in a crucial election year.
While Biden calls himself the most “pro-union president in American history,” a wave of major private sector strikes is the last thing he wants as he heads into 2024. What’s more, in addition to their grievances with Big Auto, the UAW sees a threat in another of Biden’s priorities: his green agenda. Most plants that produce electric vehicles are not unionized, and many of the batteries they require are made in China. This is catnip for leading GOP candidate Donald Trump, who called on workers to “stand strong against Biden’s vicious attack on American labor,” as well as fellow Republicans who blame Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act and electrification push for workers’ troubles.
Democrats traditionally depend on a coalition of labor and progressive voters; any erosion of that support weakens their re-election prospects in what could be a tight race in 2024. Biden also needs to hold the state of Michigan, where the UAW is a strong player: in 2020, Biden just barely won the state’s 16 electoral votes.
A prolonged autoworkers’ strike would seriously damage the American economy, imperiling Biden’s re-election bid. And yet Union Joe has to walk a fine line. Last Friday he attempted to shore up his union bona fides, stating that “record corporate profits… should be shared by record contracts for the UAW.”
But that, in turn, only raised the ire of business interests. US Chamber of Commerce president Suzanne P. Clark accused Biden of “promoting unionization at all cost.” Biden can’t catch a break – and it’ll only get tougher as election day approaches.
A United Auto Workers union member holds a sign outside Stellantis Sterling Heights Assembly Plant to mark the beginning of contract negotiations in Sterling Heights, Mich., in July.
US autoworkers drive a hard bargain
Unionized workers at America’s Big 3 automakers could be on strike as of Sept. 14. The 146,000 members of the United Auto Workers and their pugnacious president, Shawn Fain, are ready to rumble. For the first time, the UAW has not yet chosen a “target” company against which to strike but has threatened to walk off the jobs at all three at once.
What do they want?
The UAW is demanding a 46% pay raise, a 32-hour week with 40 hours of pay, and a restoration of traditional pensions. In response, Ford offered a 9% wage increase and one-time lump-sum payments, for a total raise of 15% over four years. Stellantis and GM have yet to file counterproposals, leading to the UAW recently filing charges of unfair labor practices against them.
What would a strike do to the US economy?
The auto biz makes up 3% of US GDP. A tripartite 10-day strike could cost workers and employers $5.6 billion. During a 40-day UAW strike in 2019, GM alone lost $3.6 billion. The union’s strike fund is estimated to last about three months, so this could be a long haul.
Canada’s 18,000 autoworkers and their union, UNIFOR, have also voted to strike on September 18, but will only target Ford. Analysts predict this could impact the Canadian supply chain and raise vehicle prices, further fueling inflation.
What are the political implications?
The strike puts US President Joe Biden between a rock and a hard place, just in time for a presidential election year. His focus on electrifying America’s vehicle fleet has sparked workers’ fears of wage and job cuts, as EVs require fewer and lower-skilled employees to produce.
The conflict is also playing out as part of a larger class war that is shaping politics around the globe. The Big 3 collectively posted income of $164 billion over the past decade and their CEOs earn multi millions annually. Fain has bitterly complained about one standard for the corporate class and another for ordinary workers. So far, he has refused to endorse Biden, but also said that the return of Republican Donald Trump would be “a disaster”.
What’s next?
Biden recently named a White House liaison to the union and the automakers. He claims a strike can be averted, but faced with the two sides so far apart, most industry watchers believe a strike is inevitable. As one Michigan analyst put it, “President Fain has declared war, and that usually means there’s going to be a battle, and that battle would be a strike.”