Before the United Auto Workers (UAW) union began its strike last week after it failed to reach an agreement with Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis on a new contract, President Joe Biden was encouraging the sides to work together, and even predicted that the union ultimately wouldn’t strike – comments that drew heavy criticism from UAW President Shawn Fain. Biden later added that automakers should share profits with union members, and noted that he planned to send White House adviser Gene Sperling and Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su to Detroit this week to help in any way they could. Regardless, Fain was quick to note that the Biden Administration would not have any role in the ongoing talks with automakers, and now, it seems as if Biden has reversed course, according to CNBC.
Neither Sperling nor Su will travel to Detroit after all, though the duo could still head there next week, according to a White House official. In the meantime, the UAW did agree to speak with the White House via Zoom, while the latter added that “we’ll continue to assess travel timing based on the active state of negotiations.”
“This battle is not about the president,” Fain said of Biden’s intervention in contract discussions with the Detroit Big Three automakers. “It’s not about the former president or any other person prior to that. This battle is about the workers standing up for economic and social justice and getting their fair share because they’re fed up with going backwards.”
Meanwhile, Ford and the UAW don’t seems to be particularly close to hammering out a new deal, with each trading jabs in a very public manner in recent days. While the UAW is only striking at one plant belonging to each automaker at the moment, just yesterday, Fain announced that it plans to take action at additional facilities if substantial progress isn’t made by this coming Friday.
We’ll have more on the UAW strike soon, so be sure and subscribe to Ford Authority for more 2023 Ford-UAW news, UAW news, and non-stop Ford news coverage.
Comments
Fain says this is not about the president or former president, it’s about Shawn Fain.
Fain is a hypocrite. Last June, he was at the White House soliciting political support. Now, he does want it. Why? As Mackie alluded, Fain is in this for Fain. He won his office by a very narrow margin. He wants this to be his crowning achievement. I just hope he his man enough to own the resultant downstream ill effects.
Wrong. He is directly keeping the membership involved every step of the way instead of taking bribes and laundering money as past UAW leadership has done. We don’t know what the outcome will be, but he has done a lot for us so far.
Shawn? Is that you? Can I borrow $10k?
Ha the most union friendly president was told to hit the road by the union. That should tell you all you need to know.
Fain will use this as a stepping stone for an executive job at some woke company. The UAW workers who weren’t happy being the highest paid autoworkers in the world might be happy with a job at McDonalds making $15/hr when they all get furloughed in the coming weeks. Fain makes a little over $210k a year! He is disproportionaly higher paid than the CEO’s he’s calling greedy!! LOL. SUCKERS!!