United Auto Workers Union Slams Biden’s Climate Law

It hasn’t endorsed the sitting president for next year’s election.

The United Auto Workers Union has been on a tear lately, with the president throwing Stellantis’ contract proposal in a garbage can on camera, showing it’s willing to play hardball. While the union is pressuring automakers for demands like a 40% increase in pay, it’s also taking a swing at President Joe Biden and what’s perceived as a slight with the Inflation Reduction Act.

Ford’s CEO admits EVs will cost many their jobs.

Of course, the Inflation Reduction Act wasn’t really about combatting inflation but instead was a repackaged Green New Deal. The naming trick threw off a fair number of people, but UAW isn’t amused about how it pushes electric vehicles using taxpayer dollars.

The big gripe the union has about the act that was signed into law about a year ago is, according to The Guardian, how it doesn’t hold automakers’ feet to the fire about the treatment of factory workers. That makes sense since UAW’s job is to advocate for the people who assemble your vehicle.

More specifically, the union seems to think the Biden Administration should’ve used the rather sizable, taxpayer-funded incentives being dangled in front of automakers not only as carrots but also as sticks. UAW wanted the president to twist arms so automakers were forced to provide certain guarantees as far as pay and worker conditions.

Exactly what those guarantees would be isn’t too hard to guess considering what UAW is demanding in “negotiations” with Stellantis at the moment. The problem is the international automaker, which owns a smattering of American, Italian, and French car brands at this point, claims the union’s demands could land it in the poor house and in turn do the same for assembly line workers. Is that accurate or is UAW completely justified in its actions? That’s the big question.

Depending on how you feel about the UAW demands, you might think using the executive branch of the federal government to force those conditions on automakers would’ve been justified. For now, UAW sounds like it won’t be endorsing Biden or anyone else for the 2024 presidential race.

Images via GM, Ford