UAW Seizes on Donald Trump Praising Musk for Firing Workers
(Bloomberg) -- The United Auto Workers pounced on former President Donald Trump complimenting the tactics Elon Musk takes with employees of his companies, turning the remarks into messaging against the Republican nominee that the union will aim at a key constituency of voters.
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“I mean, I look at what you do,” Trump told Musk late Monday on X, the social media service he owns. “You walk in, you say, ‘You want to quit?’ They go on strike.”
“They go on strike and you say, ‘That’s OK, you’re all gone,’” Trump said.
The UAW cut a video of Trump praising Musk, the world’s wealthiest man, and posted the clip on social media sites, writing to its more than 125,000 followers on X: “He’s for the billionaires. Not for you. Donald Trump is a scab.”
Trump said during the exchange that he wasn’t going to mention the name of the Musk-led company he was referring to. The billionaire has threatened staff at Tesla Inc. against unionizing, sued the National Labor Relations Board over a complaint the agency filed against SpaceX, and carried out mass firings at Twitter, now X, after acquiring the social media company in late 2022.
The UAW has filed an unfair labor practice charge against Trump and Musk with the NLRB, alleging their conversation constituted illegal intimidation against workers.
The UAW endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris late last month ahead of a rally in Detroit, where the Democratic nominee shared the stage with Shawn Fain, the union’s president.
The UAW has more than 400,000 active and retired members in Michigan and represents thousands of additional workers throughout battleground states in the upper Midwest. Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan are expected to be among the most important swing states that will determine the winner of the November election.
(Updates with UAW’s unfair labor practice charge in the sixth paragraph.)
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