Trump, Biden campaigns spar over support of UAW workers, EV mandates

By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Donald Trump on Thursday urged the United Auto Workers union to back his campaign, a day after the union’s president met with President Joe Biden after raising concerns about electric- vehicle policies.

Trump, the former Republican president seeking a return to office in 2024, said Democrat Biden was “waging war on the U.S. auto industry” through “crippling” electric vehicle mandates and urged the UAW to endorse him. Trump made the comments in a video posted on his social media platform, Truth Social.

Biden’s campaign responded that Trump was “the most anti-union president in modern history, stacking his cabinet with anti-union officials.” It added that under Biden, “more than 120,000 auto manufacturing jobs have come back to the United States, and new auto factories are popping up across the country.”

Trump said he advocated trade policies to help U.S. autoworkers during his presidency, including renegotiating trade deals. Biden’s campaign said that he supported incentives that helped dramatically add more U.S. electric vehicle and battery production.

UAW President Shawn Fain, who represents 150,000 U.S. hourly workers at General Motors (NYSE:), Ford Motor (NYSE:), and Chrysler parent Stellantis, has held off so far on endorsing Biden for re-election and has criticized some administration EV policies. Most other major unions have already endorsed Biden.

The UAW said in May that “another Donald Trump presidency would be a disaster. But our members need to see an alternative that delivers real results.”

In his Truth Social post on Thursday, Trump vowed to “terminate” green vehicle mandates, warning that if they continued under Biden, “American auto production will be totally dead.” Many congressional Republicans have also criticized Biden’s electcric-vehicle rules, arguing they would force automakers to end gasoline-powered production.

The trade group representing nearly all major automakers last month urged the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to ease its proposal to cut vehicle emissions through 2032, saying this approach was “neither reasonable nor achievable.”

The EPA said in April the proposed 2027-2032 standards would cut emissions by 56% and require 67% of new vehicles to be electric by 2032.

Earlier this month the UAW called on the Biden administration to soften its proposed vehicle emissions rules.

Fain said last week the UAW was not ready to endorse Biden. “We have expectations and that’s why we haven’t made endorsements yet,” he said. “We expect people to be there for us if they want our endorsement.”