This is not good news for Canada who appears to be hoping that leftists in congress will support the Canadian position on retention of the USMCA trade deal. However, the position of the United Auto Workers and their President Shawn Fain works perfectly with the position of President Trump and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer.
The UAW leadership supported Kamala Harris in 2024, and they carry a lot of sway with Democrats in congress. In fact, it is entirely possible the 20 Democrat Senators who wrote a letter to USTR Greer about getting tough on Mexico and Canada, may have been responding directly to what UAW President Shawn Fain is demanding.
The UAW rank and file align with President Trump and their leadership, despite their roots of alignment with Democrats, support the trade tariff approach by President Trump. All of that nuanced interest now begins to assemble quickly, and the political leverage plan of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney looks weaker by the day.
Wall Street Journal – As North America’s trade treaty approaches renewal or renegotiation this summer, United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain slammed the deal and called on the U.S. to upend it—or scrap it altogether.
Fain’s position pits the 400,000-member union against both the American and foreign-based automakers that are calling on the U.S. to preserve the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade treaty, or USMCA.
[…] Fain blamed USMCA and its predecessor, the North American Free Trade Agreement, for the loss of millions of American auto manufacturing jobs over the last several decades.
“Where it didn’t eliminate jobs entirely, it slashed wages and benefits,” said Fain, wearing a “Kill NAFTA” T-shirt on a video call. “There is no future for the U.S. working class that doesn’t address the free-trade disaster.”
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