UAW president slams Big Three 30 days before contract expires

By Web staff

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    MICHIGAN (WNEM) — The president of the United Auto Workers (UAW) slammed the Big Three on Tuesday night, Aug. 15.

With just 30 days before the UAW contract expires, UAW President Shawn Fain went on Facebook with some strong words.

Talks are going so slow that the union is directing its locals to schedule a strike authorization vote as soon as possible.

“GM has responded to our demands by saying that our demands for fair wages, cost of living, retirement security and more paid time off are a threat to our collective future,” Fain said.

Fain called out General Motors, Ford, and Stellantis, even singling out a letter by Stellantis Chief Operating Officer Mark Stewart asking the union to tone down its list of demands.

Those demands called for the elimination of tiers, double-digit pay raises, defined benefit pension for all, and better benefits for all, including retirees.

“We later learned from media reports that Stewart wrote that letter from his second multimillion-dollar mansion in Acapulco, Mexico where he spent the last two weeks vacationing rather than bargaining,” Fain said.

Fain said the Big Three are making a combined profit of $21 billion through the first six months of the year, and he argued labor costs are a fraction of what goes into the price of a car.

“We’re currently living under the most prosperous period in Big Three history and yet we are attacked as unrealistic for demanding the elimination of tiers? By that logic, tiers are never going to end,” Fain said.

That strike authorization vote takes place next week, with results reported by Thursday of next week.

TV5 has reached out to the Big Three for comment but has yet to hear back.

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