UAW chief criticizes Trump’s Musk ties while backing Harris

DETROIT:

United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain on Wednesday criticized Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump's ties to billionaire Elon Musk while campaigning for Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris.

Musk endorsed Trump for November's election after the former president survived an assassination attempt in July. Later that month, the Wall Street Journal reported Musk planned to commit around $45 million a month to a new pro-Trump super political-action committee. However, after that report's publication, both Musk and Trump said the Tesla CEO never pledged any such donation.

"For months, Donald Trump has gone around trashing our state, trashing our industry, trashing the American autoworker, saying he was against electric vehicles. And then something happened," Fain said on Wednesday while campaigning for Harris.

"We saw Elon Musk announce he was going to give Donald Trump $45 million dollars a month. And all of a sudden, guess what, Trump changed his tune," Fain added, calling Trump a "sellout."

Trump has opposed any electric car mandate and been critical of EV policies under Democratic President Joe Biden but he has said recently he supports electric vehicles.

"I'm for electric cars. I have to be, because Elon endorsed me very strongly. So I have no choice," Trump said at a weekend rally, but added he supports electric vehicles "for a small slice." He went on to add: "You want to have gas-propelled cars, you want to have hybrids, you want to have every kind of a car imaginable."

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UAW has endorsed Harris, who became the Democratic presidential candidate recently after Biden stepped aside as candidate.