Biden’s intervention in the UAW-Big Three contracts: A warning to autoworkers
Marcus Day
With one month to go until contracts expire for 150,000 autoworkers at General Motors, Ford and Stellantis, the Biden administration is intervening in an effort to subvert the enormous rank-and-file opposition to a sellout.
Both Biden and the United Auto Workers union bureaucracy are acutely sensitive to the growth of autoworkers’ militant determination to reverse decades of UAW-enforced concessions and win major advances in wages, benefits and working conditions.
Biden, fearing that the administration of UAW President Shawn Fain may not have the situation under control, issued a statement Monday calling on the companies and the UAW apparatus to work together to hammer out an agreement, one that he knows will contain massive attacks on workers.
The statement is a further warning to autoworkers: As long as the contract process remains in the hands of the UAW bureaucracy and the Biden administration, the only possible outcome will be historic attacks on workers’ jobs and living standards. To prevent this, it is necessary for workers to expand the network of rank-and-file committees under their control and prepare for an all-out struggle.
In his statement, Biden writes, “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.”
By “all sides” working together, Biden, in fact, means only one side, those entities representing the interests of the corporations—management and the UAW officialdom—with workers to be completely excluded from the process.
In recent weeks, the UAW has sought to get ahead of a rank-and-file revolt by claiming it is calling for a series of popular measures, including the elimination of tiers, the restoration of cost-of-living raises and pensions, and substantial wage increases, along with other contract provisions it had previously given up. Fain’s administration lifted its supposed proposals from a widely circulated statement of the Autoworkers Rank-and-File Committee Network, which, in contrast to the UAW, outlined a strategy and initiatives for rank-and-file workers to fight for and win their demands.
The companies have responded by making clear they will bitterly resist restoring any past concessions for workers. Stellantis has reportedly demanded sweeping new concessions, with its executives making a number of provocative statements threatening workers’ jobs.
At bottom, the conflicts between corporate executives and the UAW bureaucracy are of a largely theatrical and relative character. The Big Three’s executives know that Fain and his lieutenants have worked with management to enforce concessions in the past and will do so again.
Nevertheless, Biden is no doubt nervous that the public “war of words” threatens to inflame workers’ anger and more deeply solidify rank-and-file opposition. The president is particularly concerned that a revolt by autoworkers would galvanize a broader movement in the working class, upending US imperialism’s plans to escalate its war with Russia and prepare a war against China.
Thus, Biden urges management and the UAW bureaucracy to redouble their efforts to reach a deal and impose massive job cuts and other attacks on workers. Of course, Biden cannot state this openly, so he must resort to double talk, vague allusions and lies.
First, Biden states that the “auto companies should honor the right to organize,” by which he means that the corporations should partner with the UAW bureaucracy, which has functioned as a reliable tool of management for decades, and welcome its presence at new electric vehicle (EV) plants. Later, Biden says that “the UAW deserves a contract that sustains the middle class.” If this means anything, it is that the companies should continue to support the upper-middle class layers that constitute the UAW bureaucracy, which has hundreds of officials receiving six-figure salaries.
Second, what does Biden mean by an agreement which is “fair,” a word used three times in the statement?
To understand his definition of the term, workers have only to recall the savage restructuring of the auto industry under the Obama-Biden administration. The 2009 contracts demanded by the Obama administration entailed the destruction of tens of thousands of jobs, the decimation of unemployment protections, and the elimination of cost-of-living raises. Wages for all new-hires were cut in half, and pensions were ended through the expansion of the tier system.
These historic attacks on workers were carried out with the crucial assistance of the UAW bureaucracy, including Fain, who voted in favor of the concessions as a member of the UAW-Chrysler national negotiating committee. In return, the UAW apparatus was given a controlling stake in Chrysler and billions of dollars in stock at GM and Ford.
In his statement, Biden presents the transition to EV production as a “win-win opportunity” for the companies and workers, saying:
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.
But there is no outcome that is a “win-win” for both the corporate oligarchy and the autoworkers, and Biden knows it. The colossal profits of the Big Three—a quarter of a trillion over the past decade—have been predicated upon a savage intensification of workers’ exploitation.
Biden’s references to “good wages and benefits” are worthless window dressing. The president’s overriding priority is a restructuring of the auto industry that will enable US-based corporations to “successfully compete domestically and globally.” In the frenzied capitalist competition to dominate EV markets and technologies, such an outcome can only be achieved through the destruction of tens of thousands or more jobs, brutal labor cost cuts and other attacks.
The final paragraph of the statement makes clear Biden’s commitment to plant shutdowns and job cuts. While cynically claiming that the companies should “take every possible step to avoid painful plant closings,” Biden then states “that when transitions [i.e., plant closures] are needed,” they should be “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.”
This is a recipe for a new wave of plant closures, which will further devastate working class regions such as Rockford, Illinois, where Stellantis has idled its nearby Belvidere assembly plant. To the extent that any plants reopen, it will be with a far-reduced workforce and substandard wages and benefits.
Biden, the self-described “most pro-union president in US history,” has relied on the union bureaucracies to contain and suppress a growing movement of the working class during his time in office. At the same time, the White House has repeatedly acted to shore up the legitimacy of the UAW apparatus and the administration of Shawn Fain in particular. Biden’s Department of Labor has sought to whitewash the UAW’s fraudulent, antidemocratic elections held in 2022-2023, rejecting out of hand evidence of widespread disenfranchisement compiled by rank-and-file candidate Will Lehman.
Biden’s administration has also coordinated closely with the Teamsters, the International Longshore and Warehouse Union and other unions to block strikes by workers on the railroads, at UPS and on the West Coast docks and impose corporate demands for below-inflation wage increases.
Where the class struggle has threatened to break out of the control of the union bureaucracies—as among rail workers last year—Biden has shown he is willing to use the full powers of the capitalist state against workers, as he did when he worked with congressional Democrats and Republicans to ban a rail strike and impose a contract against the workers’ will.
To defeat the conspiracy being prepared against them by the companies, the UAW bureaucracy, and the Biden administration, it is imperative that workers organize and deepen their rebellion, through the expansion of the network of rank-and-file committees. These committees will fight to abolish the pro-corporate UAW bureaucracy, transfer power to the shop floor, and launch a counteroffensive for workers’ genuine demands.
An indispensable element for waging such a struggle is an understanding that workers must establish their independence from the Biden administration, the Democratic Party and all political representatives of their class enemies.
FUK BIDEN! ALL THE WAY TO GITMO!
THE BELOW WAS PERPETRATED BY GAMER LAWYER BRIAN DEESE WHO WORKED OUT OF THE BIDEN REGIME FOR BIDEN'S BIGGEST PAYMASTER BLACKROCK.
That included the bailout of General Motors and Chrysler, based on a 50 percent cut in the pay of all newly hired autoworkers.
Biden, long known as Delaware’s “senator from DuPont,” Biden served on committees that were most sensitive to the interests of the ruling class, including the Judiciary Committee and the Foreign Relations Committee. He supported the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999, a milestone in the deregulation of the banks, and other right-wing measures. After nearly four decades in the Senate, Biden became Obama’s vice president, helping to oversee the massive bailout of Wall Street following the 2008 financial crisis and the subsequent restructuring of class relations to benefit the rich. That included the bailout of General Motors and Chrysler, based on a 50 percent cut in the pay of all newly hired autoworkers.
Biden Touts ‘Fair Transition’ to Green Auto Industry as Workers’ Pay Is Cut
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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