Biden and Trump woo unions in Michigan as auto strikes increase

DETROIT, Sept 26 (Reuters) – Joe Biden and Donald Trump will speak to striking auto workers in rare back-to-back events in Michigan this week, highlighting the importance of supporting unions in the 2024 presidential election, even though unions represent a small percentage of workers. Part of American workers.

Biden will join striking members of the United Auto Workers (UAW) on a picket line in Wayne County, Michigan, at 12:45 p.m. EDT (1645 GMT) on Tuesday, marking the first time a sitting president has joined a picket line in history. Modern United States. The White House did not announce the exact location in advance, citing “security concerns.”

Republican rival Trump, the front-runner to be his party’s 2024 presidential nominee, will address hundreds of workers at a rally at an auto supplier in a suburb of Detroit on Wednesday. The supplier, Drake Enterprises, is a non-union manufacturer, according to an AFL-CIO spokesperson. The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Republicans believe that Biden’s effort to electrify the American car fleet, by pumping billions of dollars in tax cuts into electric car manufacturing, is unpopular with auto workers.

In a statement on Tuesday, Trump accused Biden of “stabbing” auto workers in the back. He said Biden’s electric vehicle mandate would “kill” the U.S. auto industry and cost “thousands of auto workers their jobs.”

Biden said Monday that the UAW gave up an “incredible amount” when the auto industry was struggling and that the union “saved the auto industry,” an apparent reference to the 2009 government bailout that included wage cuts.

“Now that the industry is starting to pick up, they should share in the benefits,” he said.

UAW President Sean Fine will join Biden on the picket line and the union on Tuesday encouraged non-UAW workers to join local picket lines in support of the “historic” presidential visit. The source added that the union is not interested in Trump’s visit and that Fein does not plan to attend the event.

So far, the UAW has refused to support any of the 2024 presidential candidates, making it the only major union not to support Biden. Both candidates are expected to sharpen their 2024 campaign message in Michigan.

“We’re a long way from the general election, but it sure feels like the general election,” said Dave Urban, a Republican strategist who previously worked for Trump.

UAW workers this month began targeted strikes against General Motors ( GM.N ), Ford ( FN ) and Chrysler parent Stellantis ( STLAM.MI ) seeking pay increases to match CEO pay jumps, shorter work weeks and job security as the industry moves toward electric vehicles. Vehicles.

The White House is holding discussions on ways to mitigate any economic repercussions resulting from a full strike.

Only 10.1% of American workers were union members in 2022, but they have significant political influence because states where they are powerful often swing from voting Democratic to Republican, and their grassroots networks have a strong influence on the working-class vote.

Rust belt in the balance?

The auto industry and its labor movement are deeply intertwined with politics and elections in Michigan and other Midwestern US states.

Biden says support for unions is a cornerstone of his economic policies, and he has pushed investment in American manufacturing, union jobs and workers’ rights. However, he is struggling to convince voters that his economic plan, which he calls the “pedium economy,” is working while campaigning for a second term.

Trump, who at times sparred with unions as a real estate developer, cut corporate taxes as president and generally supported corporate interests over labor, experts said.

The Trump administration’s stance on labor issues has been “unconditionally anti-union,” said Robert Bruno, a professor of labor and employment relations at the University of Illinois.

However, in 2016, Trump garnered a level of support from union members that no Republican has reached since Ronald Reagan, helping him narrowly capture key states like Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin.

Biden rebounded with unions in 2020, by about 16 percentage points, winning back so-called Rust Belt states, which had suffered decades of job losses as companies embraced lower-cost, often non-union positions. He won Michigan in 2020 by 154,000 votes.

In Michigan, Trump will criticize Biden’s economic policies and incentives promoting electric vehicles, and say he will do a better job protecting workers if elected to a second term, Trump adviser Jason Miller said.

Labor experts said Trump is counting on driving a wedge between union members and their leaders, who criticized the former president’s labor policies during his term.

Karen Finney, a Democratic strategist, said it was important for Biden to make the trip to Michigan to ensure Trump does not rewrite history.

“Biden says we’re not going to let you go out there and lie to people and try to change the conversation,” Finney said.

Biden’s visit to Michigan represents the most support a sitting president has shown for striking workers since Theodore Roosevelt invited striking coal workers to the White House in 1902, historians said.

As a presidential candidate, former Vice President Biden joined multiple picket lines, including a UAW sit-in in Kansas City in 2019.

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