MAY DAY: AUTOWORKERS DIVIDED BY TARRIFS?

This May Day, when workers around the world rise to demand rights, respect and their just share of the wealth, autoworker solidarity is on the line.

“I always say ‘tariffs’ is the most beautiful word to me…It’s going to bring our country’s businesses back,” declared President Trump. That sent alarm bells ringing for Mexican and Canadian autoworkers, who feared that if the cars they made were more expensive to export, the manufacturers would export their jobs instead. Conversely, it raised hopes for many US autoworkers that closing plants in Mexico and Canada might indeed bring those jobs to the US.

When Trump uttered his “beautiful word” like a wicked hex, it immediately threatened to tear apart what the autoworkers from the three countries should so urgently be reinforcing — their fragile unity.

It’s true that, in 1994, when NAFTA implemented “free trade” rules, US automakers moved plants to Canada and Mexico, and wages went down across the hemisphere. But over the past 30 years, the auto industry has changed. Auto production today tightly knits together workers in all three countries as they produce different components of the finished vehicle that rolls into your driveway.

Trump’s tariffs attempt to answer the wrong question. For US autoworkers, the question is not about the rules for a zero-sum game, where a set number of jobs are won or lost according to rules set by Trump. The real question is — How do we get good jobs for all?

Here’s an example of the way to go — cross-border support. In 2021, GM workers in Silao, Mexico refused overtime to make products needed by John Deere when UAW workers were on strike. The UAW returned the favor by helping those same Mexican workers, who were successfully organizing a fighting union, SINTTIA. When autoworkers win better contracts in one country, it shifts the “race to the bottom” into reverse.

Nor should our concern be only about existing jobs. The UAW recognized this when they won the right to represent workers in future EV battery plants. On the Mexico side, while Trump is looking backward, President Claudia Sheinbaum is looking forward. In response to tariffs, she has speeded up the use of government resources to build new industries in line with 21st century technologies.  

Worker solidarity and advocating for the expansion of our economies, not fighting over the same few jobs, will make May Day great again.

Mark Masaoka was a leader of the UAW local union at the Van Nuys plant in California, where he worked as an electrician until the plant closed in 1992. While in the UAW, he participated in its national insurgent New Directions caucus. Always interested in expanding worker power, he currently supports Rideshare Drivers United, an independent union for Uber and Lyft drivers. A longtime advocate for the Asian American movement, Masaoka has remained active in the Asian American community and with the Democratic Socialists of America.

How did you end up working at the GM plant in Van Nuys, and what made you become a union activist?

I didn’t know anything about unions. But I met Philip Vera Cruz, the person who inspired me to join working-class struggles. As a farmworker and Marxist, Vera Cruz organized his fellow Filipino workers into the National Farm Labor Union. In 1965, his local union in Delano, California, was the first to strike against the grape companies. Vera Cruz and Cesar Chavez joined forces to form the United Farm Workers Union after the companies tried to use Mexican workers to break the strike. The civil rights movement also radicalized me, as it radicalized other young Asian Americans. I wanted to organize with workers of color.

I first worked for Ford. As a part-time worker, I earned $13 an hour — in 1976!

Most of the autoworkers there owned their own homes. But that plant closed in 1980, and I was hired in Van Nuys.

The majority of workers in Van Nuys were Latino, and there were roughly equal numbers of white and Black workers. People from all communities benefited from working at GM. Our contract allowed for retirement after 30 years, so it was possible to retire comfortably at age 50.

Aside from the cost of housing, what most concerned workers was the cost of health coverage for both workers and retirees.

When did GM decide to close Van Nuys?

GM announced it was closing Van Nuys in 1983. With the “invasion” of Japanese cars, car companies cut back on production when demand for US cars fell. Another reason for the closure was the fact that workers had gotten the benefits. Health benefits had become particularly expensive. Other countries have national health insurance, and the prospect of moving to Canada was attractive to GM. Canadian workers wouldn’t make health insurance a condition of their labor agreement. Mexico was also attractive, with its wages kept very low by union bosses eager to extract bribes and betray the workers.

But we weren’t going to walk away from our jobs without doing anything. We formed a large coalition of workers and the community and threatened to boycott GM cars. We received such favorable press coverage that even conservative legislators joined the fight to keep Van Nuys open. That mobilization kept the plant open for nine years.

Van Nuys finally closed in 1992. It was a disaster for the workers. Laid-off workers who had been earning $18 an hour had to take jobs that paid perhaps $8, because the major industrial plants in Southern California had closed. And, of course, the community that had thrived around the plant declined.

NAFTA was signed the same year Van Nuys closed, and our Chevy Camaro production was transferred to Canada. My last task at the plant was packing production equipment for a maquiladora in Mexico. Was that equipment destined for the new GM plant in Silao? That plant opened in 1996, so it’s possible.

With companies moving abroad, it’s common for workers to blame foreign workers for their job losses. This was horribly demonstrated by the beating death of Vincent Chin.

In 1982, a pair of UAW workers murdered Vincent Chin, a Chinese American man. They believed he was Japanese and accused the Japanese of taking American jobs. They randomly took out their misdirected rage on an Asian American man. My local union sent a delegation to Los Angeles to support Chin’s mother, who was demanding justice for her son.

It is absolutely critical that union leadership be crystal clear about who is responsible for job losses and who is not. Unfortunately, the UAW’s “Buy American” campaign promoted a false nationalism. These campaigns fail to educate members about how employers pit workers of different nationalities against each other. They fail to help workers understand the importance of unity across borders.

Do you think SINTTIA’s recent victory at GM’s Silao plant will affect workers in the US?

The inequality is so wide — US autoworkers earn 10 times more than Mexican workers — that even if SINTTIA gets a huge raise, it won’t be enough to make GM reconsider changing where it manufactures cars. Still, the better the contracts for Mexican workers, the less incentive there will be for US companies to transfer their production to Mexico.

Where there will be a big change is at the social level. Eliminating the fake unions (charros) in Mexico will change the solidarity between workers in the US and Mexico. By eliminating the fake unions, unionized workers will be able to unite across borders to coordinate strategies and confront corporate power. We can finish the race and rise together!

Update: On April 26, from the Canada side of the Detroit River, the autoworkers union Unifor demonstrated against Trump’s tariffs. Although UAW President Shawn Fain and many UAW members in the US had expressed support for at least some tariffs, UAW members on the Michigan side rallied to support the Canadian workers.