WAYNE COUNTY (WWJ) - President Joe Biden is set to join striking autoworkers at a facility in Wayne County on Tuesday, one day ahead of a visit to the state planned by former President Donald Trump.
Biden is due in Michigan just before noon on Sept. 26 and will join UAW workers on the picket line at Michigan Assembly Plant in the afternoon, WWJ's Charlie Langton reports.
The White House said the president will "stand in solidarity with the men and women of UAW as they fight for a fair share of the value they helped create."
“This is a president that has made it very clear that corporate profit should lead to a record UAW contract,” said White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
UAW President Shawn Fain is expect to join the president when he does arrive.
Governor Gretchen Whitmer and Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist II praised Biden's trip as "historic" and that is shows his support for working class families.
“President Biden’s visit to Michigan, home of the Big Three, to support our world-class autoworkers is historic,” said Whitmer. “The president is committed to strengthening our workforce and economy by bringing jobs home from overseas, reversing trends of the previous administration that lost jobs. Since taking office, we've announced 36,000 auto jobs with help from President Biden’s investments, proving it’s possible to support working men and women, while also securing record-breaking economic development deals that will guarantee jobs and investment for decades.”
The presidential visit comes a little more than 24 hours ahead of Trump's own trip to Metro Detroit to meet with striking autoworkers on Wednesday, Sept. 27.
Trump's campaign confirmed the trip, first reported last week, stating the former president will speak to roughly 500 UAW workers at 8 p.m. at Drake Enterprises in Clinton Township.
Doors will open for the event at 4 p.m..
Trump's visit comes at the same time that other GOP hopefuls will meet at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California, for the cycle’s second primary debate. Trump is skipping the event to come to Michigan.
When asked about the strike in an interview that aired last weekend, Trump told NBC News that “auto workers will not have any jobs" because "electric cars, automatically, are going to be made in China.”
“The auto workers are being sold down the river by their leadership, and their leadership should endorse Trump,” he added.
Ammar Moussa, a Biden campaign spokesperson, said last week after news of Trump's visit was made public: “Donald Trump is going to Michigan next week to lie to Michigan workers and pretend he didn’t spend his entire failed presidency selling them out at every turn. Instead of standing with workers, Trump cut taxes for the super-wealthy while auto companies shuttered their doors and shipped American jobs overseas.”
Moussa argued that Trump would have let auto companies go bankrupt during the financial crisis rather than bail them out, as President Barack Obama did in 2009.
UAW President Shawn Fain also had scathing words for Trump as details of his trip were revealed last week, stating:
“Every fiber of our union is being poured into fighting the billionaire class and an economy that enriches people like Donald Trump at the expense of workers. We can’t keep electing billionaires and millionaires that don’t have any understanding what it is like to live paycheck to paycheck and struggle to get by and expecting them to solve the problems of the working class.”