Before revealing the message written on his shirt under his suit jacket, United Auto Workers Union President Shawn Fain revved up the crowd at the first day of the Democratic National Convention Monday by invoking the 2002 hit from rapper Nelly.
“In the words of the great American poet Nelly. It’s getting hot in here,” Fain said, uncovering his “Trump is a scab” T-shirt he’d been wearing under his suit jacket.
Fain has been using the union term “scab” for former President Donald Trump throughout the 2024 election cycle, likening Trump to the scabs companies bring in from the outside to continue operations as union members go on strike for better treatment.
While President Joe Biden walked the picket line in Michigan in September with UAW members during the historic strike against the Detroit “Big Three” automakers, Trump visited a non-union automotive parts manufacturer in the state where thousands of workers were striking.
Trump and his running mate, Ohio U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance, are outsiders to the middle class acting as “two lap dogs for the billionaire class who only serve themselves,” Fain said.
But Harris has “walked the walk” for the working class, Fain said, citing Harris joining the picket line in 2019, as more than 40,000 UAW workers were on strike at dozens of General Motors plants for 40 days.
“It’s hot in here because you’re fired up and you’re fed up, and the American working class is fired up and fed up,” Fain said to the DNC crowd in Chicago. “Kamala Harris stands shoulder to shoulder with workers when they’re on strike and that’s the difference between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump the scab.”
Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, who prior to serving in the U.S. House, was a union member as a public schoolteacher.
Walz has been speaking in battleground states across the country in recent weeks, trying to turn the tide to victory after Trump was leading many states in polls earlier this year against President Joe Biden before he dropped out. Earlier this month in Nevada, Walz tied Trump to Project 2025, a 922-page right-wing plan that serves as a blueprint to a national abortion ban and repealing union rights among other measures.
Trump has denied any connection to Project 2025 though CNN found 140 of Trump’s former employees were involved.
Walz said in Nevada “when someone draws up a blueprint, they plan on using it.”
The American working class is in “a fight for our lives” Fain said, as a Trump presidency threatens to undo all the progress unions have had in the last year.
“Last fall, we achieved life-changing gains in our strike at the Big Three [automakers]. We even won a commitment to reopen a closed plant not too far from here. We were able to do that thanks to the support of Kamala Harris and Joe Biden and the thousands of autoworkers that went on strike,” Fain said. “But a year later, one company wants to go back on their commitments in our contract. And let me be clear, Stellantis must keep the promises they made to America in our union contract, and the UAW will take whatever action necessary.”
Leaders from six other unions also spoke Monday at the DNC to support Harris: American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) President Lee Saunders; International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) International President Kenneth W. Cooper; Service Employees International Union (SEIU) President April Verrett; Laborers’ International Union of North America (LiUNA) General President Brent Booker; Communications Workers of America (CWA) President Claude Cummings Jr.; and American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) President Liz Shuler.
Harris made a surprise appearance on the first day of the DNC to talk about the future and what’s at stake in November. There is a path to victory, but Harris said to “make no mistake, the road ahead will not be not easy.”
A win in November will take people of all ages and backgrounds talking with neighbors and family members about the future of reproductive rights, affordable health care and equity for the working class, Harris said. And those small fights for the future are happening all over the country.
“We see it in so many of you who are working, not just to get us through our current crises, but to somewhere better. There’s something happening, all across the country. It’s not about Joe [Biden] or me. It’s about you,” Harris said. “And we’ve shown that, when we vote, we expand access to health care, expand access to the ballot box, and ensure that more working families can make a decent living.”
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