President Joe Biden is breaking his silence as the United Auto Workers (UAW) negotiate four-year contracts with the nation’s top automakers — General Motors (GM), Ford, and Stellantis.
As part of those negotiations, UAW President Shawn Fain is wanting concessions from the automakers that the Biden administration’s rapid push toward Electric Vehicles (EVs) will not upend the livelihoods of American auto workers and slash their wages, as has already happened.
Among its demands, the UAW wants Biden to require that GM, Ford, and Stellantis maintain a middle-class wage for auto workers when they are moved to EV plants in the future if they want to secure billions in taxpayer-funded subsidies via the president’s Inflation Reduction Act.
In a statement, Biden touted a “fair transition” to EVs but stopped short of making commitments to auto workers. Despite the UAW’s concerns, Biden said the EV transition is a necessity.
“The need to transition to a clean energy economy should provide a win-win opportunity for auto companies and unionized workers,” Biden said in a statement:
It should enable workers to make good wages and benefits to support their families, while leading us into a future where America is leading the way in reducing vehicle emissions and producing autos that will successfully compete domestically and globally. Companies should use this process to make sure they enlist their workers in the next chapter of the industry by offering them good-paying jobs and a say in the future of their workplace. [Emphasis added]
As the Big Three auto companies and the United Auto Workers come together — one month before the expiration of their contract — to negotiate a new agreement, I want to be clear about where I stand. I’m asking all sides to work together to forge a fair agreement. [Emphasis added]
I support a fair transition to a clean energy future. That means ensuring that Big Three auto jobs are good jobs that can support a family; that auto companies should honor the right to organize; take every possible step to avoid painful plant closings; and ensure that when transitions are needed, the transitions are fair and look to retool, reboot, and rehire in the same factories and communities at comparable wages, while giving existing workers the first shot to fill those jobs. The UAW helped create the American middle class and as we move forward in this transition to new technologies, the UAW deserves a contract that sustains the middle class. [Emphasis added]
Already, though, a so-called “fair transition” — thanks to Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act — has been woefully lopsided to benefitting automakers’ top line while auto workers have been pushed into more dangerous jobs with lower pay.
In Lordstown, Ohio, for instance, GM and LG’s EV battery plant known as Ultium Cells replaced GM’s old vehicle assembly plant. Auto workers at the former plant earned up to $30 an hour, while workers at Ultium Cells are earning about $16.50 an hour with a raise to $20 an hour after seven years of employment.
This suggests a 45 percent drop in wages for auto workers in Lordstown. Fain said some of the auto workers at Ultium Cells are working another job to make ends meet.
Meanwhile, GM and LG — through the Ultium Cells plant, alone — could rake in more than $1 billion annually in subsidies included in Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act.
Similarly, in Marshall, Michigan, Ford’s latest battery plant could take in about $6.7 billion worth of subsidies from Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, even as auto workers at the plant are promised a humble $45,000 annual salary.
The UAW has made a point to note the record profits and earnings of GM, Ford, and Stellantis in recent months and years. In the first half of the year, for example, Stellantis reported record profits at $12.1 billion — a 37 percent increase over the last year.
Former President Donald Trump has been the lone GOP candidate for president, hoping to run again against Biden, actively courting the votes of auto workers, since the UAW has refused, thus far, to endorse the president in his re-election.
Specifically, Trump has blasted Biden’s EV transition as a corporate giveaway that leaves auto workers footing the cost.
Other GOP presidential primary candidates like former Vice President Mike Pence, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former United States Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, and Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) have made little-to-no effort to secure an endorsement from the UAW or win over its members.
For years, Breitbart News has detailed how a publicly funded transition from combustion engines to EVs has the potential to eliminate millions of American auto jobs and leave auto workers with drastically cut wages.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.
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