United Auto Workers Withholds Support for Biden’s Reelection Campaign Over His EV Policies

Electric vehicle parking at a grocery store in Mount Joy, Penn., in February 2023. Beth Brelje/The Epoch Times

United Auto Workers (UAW) is delaying its endorsement of President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign, according to a May 2 union memo.

The Detroit-based union is holding back out of concern for recent Biden administration policies that encourage the transition to electric vehicles (EVs).

UAW, based in Detroit, has not endorsed the president, whom it supported in 2020, due to the administration’s efforts involving climate change, such as encouraging the production of EVs.

“Several national unions were quick to endorse [Biden],” UAW President Shawn Fain said in an employee memo (pdf). “The United Auto Workers is not yet making an endorsement.

The UAW announcement came on the heels of a meeting between UAW leadership, members of the Biden administration, and several members of Congress.

The memo stated that UAW representatives expressed concern about the possible impact of transitioning to electric vehicles.

“The federal government is pouring billions into the electric vehicle transition, with no strings attached and no commitment to workers,” Fain said. “The EV transition is at serious risk of becoming a race to the bottom. We want to see national leadership have our back on this before we make any commitments.”

The union president stated that “we emphasized the need for any EV shift to be a ‘just transition,’ where the workers who make the auto industry run aren’t left behind.”

Some of the policies involving EVs include their toughest-ever car emissions rule that is set up to force a surge in EV purchases.

The changes, which were announced on April 12, would affect virtually all gasoline-powered vehicles on U.S. highways, save consumers an estimated $12,000 in fuel and maintenance costs over the lifetime of a vehicle, and prevent nearly 10 billion tons of carbon dioxide emissions by 2055, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

The measure is intended to advance the president’s agenda of having 50 percent of all new cars and light trucks and 30 percent of all new medium- and heavy-duty trucks be zero-emission vehicles by 2030.

Fain made a point to note that “there is no question about the UAW’s intent ... members come first, before all politics.”

However, in the company-wide talking points on the issue, the union president said that “another Donald Trump presidency would be a disaster. But our members need to see an alternative that delivers real results. We need to get our members organized behind a pro-worker, pro-climate, and pro-democracy political program that can deliver for the working class.”

Biden has described himself as the most pro-union president in history, and he frequently addresses union employees about job creation and manufacturing in the United States.

Other unions, such as the Service Employees International Union and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, have already backed Biden.

The White House did not immediately respond to The Epoch Times’ request for comment.