UAW Blasts GM For Shutting Down Lordstown Plant In New Video
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The United Auto Workers (UAW) has released a new video criticizing GM for shutting down the GM Lordstown plant in Warren, Ohio. The video also calls out Ford and Stellantis for its plant closures. The new video was released as the UAW continues to strike against all three of the Big Detroit automakers in response to the expiration of previous labor contracts.
The final Chevrolet Cruze as it was being built at Lordstown
Clocking in at a little over three-and-a-half minutes, the video includes statements from UAW President Shawn Fain.
“Our hometowns are under attack. Belvidere, Lordstown, Romeo – just a few years ago, they were thriving towns and profitable auto plants,” Fain says, referencing Stellantis, GM, and Ford facilities, respectively.
According to the video, the Big Three Detroit automakers have collectively closed 65 plants in the last two decades, which has had a significant impact on local communities.
“Plant closures shutter local businesses, wreck lives and rip apart families,” Fain adds.
Chevrolet Cruze on the production line at Lordstown Assembly in 2012
The video goes on to highlight the experience of several former GM Lordstown employees, including Dustin Rose, who says that the closure “completely turned my life upside down.”
The GM Lordstown plant opened in 1966, and spans some 6.2 million square feet on 905 acres. The plant included vehicle assembly, a paint shop, a body shop, and a metal stamping facility. GM began winding down production at the facility in 2017 following declining sales of the Chevy Cruz, ending the third shift in January of that year, affecting 1,200 workers. GM eliminated the second shift at the plant in 2018, cutting 1,500 jobs in the process. GM announced it would build the Chevy Blazer at the GM Ramos Arizpe plant in Mexico the same day that it ended the second shift at the Lordstown plant, drawing the ire of the UAW. The Lordstown plant finally ended production in 2019. GM later entered into talks to sell the plant.
Check out the full UAW video right here:
The UAW is currently striking at all three of the Big Detroit automakers, recently expanding its strike against GM and Stellantis due to a lack of progress in contract negotiations.
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When I look over the parking lot of my local GM plant, I gaze on a lot of non-GM products…..hmmm…..maybe the strike fund would be better spent incentivizing UAW members to buy their own products
With the corporate greed the workers can’t afford to buy what they build. The companies have made billions in profit. The ceo millions Where employees have been stagnant at the same wage for many years and gave up so much just to keep a job through their bankruptcies. Car prices have soared yet workers are not the reason. Inflation is skyrocketing. Shareholders and ceo are making millions Workers are a mere 4% of vehicle. Companies can share the record profits with the ones that actually build the product
50% of UAW members do not earn enough to even get a loan for a 40,000$ car, or a 55,000$ used truck.over nearly half of GMs kine workers earn less than Mcd/Wallyworld workers
I might consider looking for a different job then? Ironically, I know many individuals that are doing QUITE well selling the sometimes inferior automobiles that the UAW produces.
I lived in the Flint area for many years and I can attest that most union members had boats and motor homes and lived in nice neighborhoods just like the salaried workers.
When you are paid$17.00 an hour you expect someone to buy a new vehicle from $50k – 80k +. AND be able to afford housing, childcare, groceries, gas and utilities.
Talk about delusional!
GM lied and cheated thousands of employees and taxpayers when they closed lordstown.
GM is still dodging the responsibility of obligations it owes years later.
I hope Mary Barra and Gerald Johnson burn for this.
Unfortunately for those at the top, the folks at the plant level often have as much value as any other piece of equipment that can be scrapped.
It is sad that an employee of any manufacturer can’t afford to purchase a vehicle that they helped build.
Just shut up, damn. This whole charade is insufferable.
Slam Trump as you will, he called Mary Barra on the carpet for the closure.
And what came of it? They all come back?
All he did was blow steam and name call. He didn’t do 95% of what he said but people who couldn’t be bothered to think for themselves ate it up.
Not saying the other guy is doing it right either, but I guess I’d rather he droll in his Cheerio’s while someone else makes the decisions over what we had before.
At least he did something. For how many decades did factory after factory close and presidents did nothing?
Never great to see a plant close, but this was an old one with a spotty quality record selling a product that was quickly loosing market share.
Didn’t help the plant was starved of product.
For all the down voters, do you not think that having additional product beyond the Cruze sedan would have helped?
Like what? Don’t blame manufacturers for abandoning some markets. The fixed costs of most vehicles are nearly impossible to cover. When the margin is small and the risk is high, why bother? Hate it all you want but the truck market has plenty of protection built in. There isn’t single elected person out there that will touch that market but at the same time, if those same protections were across the board, the production mix here would be completely different.
What doomed the Cruze is when gm imported the Cruise hatchback from Mexico, just like the stupid decision to import the Spaek from Korea to sink the Sonic’s market share.
What doomed the Cruze was the Cruze. A crappy little car with no style, no handling, and no go. That thing was destined to fail before it hit the street. It was a POS.
By the way you describe the car it would have been perfect for you. Both Cruze generations were great cars and rated at the top of their class. It was due for a renewal and the market was changing.
We had leased (3) Cruzes over the years. Two of the older body style and one of the refreshed. Had no issues with any of them. Great gas mileage too! I would think something similar would sell well today.
Begin bear.
Complete bs.
Lordstown set quality records. We did everything GM asked and more. Piss poor management was blamed on the workers.
This plant closing was purely corporate greed and a way for GM to offshore work. Nothing else.
The shocking thing is the UAW either doesn’t realize that they’re in big part to blame for this or refuse to acknowledge it.
This commercial is just as much proof of their failure than anything else. Guess who isn’t shutting down US plants to find a better workforce? Non UAW automakers.
I happen to agree with them. Closing the Lordstown Ohio plant was shortsighted, stupid, and to make it worse, badly managed. The plant could have been converted to produce new compact crossovers and EVs. But gm management as usual cant see beyond their noses.
Really, the union shutting down plants is OK. As long as it’s their idea. But screw the auto makers if they do. No wonder the unions ate a joke anymore.
Why pick a job where you don’t like paycheck. Sounds like another carrer choice would be good option. McDonald’s, wallmart. Construction but not cars. Get a life & stop whining!!
Declining market share in a ever competitive market.
There are no shortage of crappy Toyota dealers with market adjustments. In fact, I’d wager that they more common than a GM dealer with market adjustments.
It’s funny to me that on the one hand the UAW is going on about how much profit GM has been making recently, but on the other hand they are complaining about the decisions they made that got them there.
Plus over the past 10 years these UAW members received over $100k in profit sharing, averaging just over $10k a year. 2013-$6750, 2014-$9000, 2015-$11000, 2016-$12000, 2017-$11750, 2018-$10750, 2019-$8000, 2020-$9000, 2021-$10250 and 2022-$12750 = $101,250 (or $122,338 in 2023 dollars if accounting for inflation). While GM management has made numerous catastrophic errors, it remains profitable for now – largely due to full size trucks which the current administration is attacking via escalating CAFE restrictions and fines. GM has been shrinking itself to profitability since 2016 when it sold 10M vehicles globally, and now over half of its roughly 2M annual US sales are low fuel efficient, body on frame trucks (Silverado, Sierra, Colorado, Tahoe, Escalade, etc). GM, like the rest of the big 3 is in a major bind and banking of EVs to save the day with respect to reduced workforce and improved CAFE averages. The UAW is 1/5 the size it was in 1980 and diminishing steadily.
Over 50% of workers did not even come close- Covid lay off, chip shortages, parts stream interruptions and the strike reduced many of the employees to 50% or less profit share.for 4 of those years
U Ain’t Workin’.
I.C.E. forever, I’ll NEVER drive a toaster !!!
Right or wrong it’s old news.
Right, Carl! This conversation has no relevance. It’s old news.
Blame the previous Govt/ political leaders..allowing the Corporate giants to move their production overseas and Mexice. This should have been stopped immediately…but mindless voters continued to elect politicians who supporeted these moves
I work in an industry which relies heavily on light/medium-duty trucks produced by all (3) manufacturers (and others). We are still reeling from the effects of COVID – supply chain issues, chip shortages, etc. While the UAW is definitely not responsible for all of that, they certainly could not have picked a worse time to strike and force the closing of plants. In my current work capacity, my contributions enable my employers to make a ton of money. Although they pay me well and occasionally provide bonuses, I still can’t afford the home(s), cars, boats, other toys, vacations, etc. that they enjoy. Sound familiar?
I am amazed at the finger-pointing as to who is to blame for the worker not being happy. You the worker are to blame for your unhappiness. You control your and your family’s life, not the corporations, the unions, and certainly not the government. There are millions of jobs and opportunities in the US. If you aren’t happy, find a new job or a new career. And don’t tell me it’s hard, I can’t move, I might have to go back to school etc. etc. I have heard every excuse in the book. Yes, it is change and no one likes change, but if you are not happy, only you can make it happen. I am sure the corporations and union will come to some type of agreement but I guarantee you the majority of the workers will not be happy with the outcome. So, if you want corporations, unions and our government to control your life, go for it, but then stop your complaining.
Spot on – could not have stated it better! Unions (as well as their protections) are always interesting. I am friends with a union electrician working in a nuclear power plant making a BOAT LOAD of money. He readily admits that the hardest part of his job is just trying to “look busy”. My neighbor is another union worker in the trades. He gets paid overtime for “working” nearly every Saturday but admits to not doing much work at all on Saturdays. No wonder things are F’d up!
Maybe the Lordstown plant workers can get these new green jobs that are so prevalent. AOC and Biden promisee the jobs were there for the taking. Get on it!
I don’t have a dog in this current fight, but grew up in Youngstown, which is why I always click on something about Lordstown.
Lots of strong opinions flying around, but here’s some facts about Lordstown…if anyone cares to read them:
– Lordstown was a very good job for a lot of families…just about anyone without a college degree wanted to work there because the pay benefits was hard to beat. So there’s no doubt closing this plant had a major impact on a lot of people.
– The Youngstown/Lordstown area was certainly not “thriving”, and hadn’t been since the 70s…saying it was thriving is dishonest…the Youngstown area can be a tough place, with very few economic bright spots outside YSU and Lordstown. I really wish the Youngstown area could catch a good break and have some booming years…lot of hardworking, good people in that area.
– the Lordstown build quality could be very poor…they could never make consistent improvements and I think that was a negative contribution of the UAW…when Pontiac existed, they built the Sunbird and the Cavalier…dumbasses would sometimes build one side of the car as a Bird and the other as a Cav. Despite assembly issues, I owned several of these cars and they were all fairly reliable – much better than some newer German cars I’ve owned since.
– knowing the base hourly wage of a plant worker is not an true indicator of every worker’s income…those that could would work holidays, during scheduled closures, and at other times and collect triple-time or more. Not everyone could, but those with seniority could make a lot of money there…senior people had nice houses in nice neighborhoods.
– some of the worker’s tasks can be completed in seconds…then they wait 5-7 minutes doing nothing until it’s time for the next one…when I see UAW “skilled labor” signs, I always laugh…there are certainly some jobs that require skill, but certainly not for many.
– back in the day, people would burn/destroy an import car if they saw one…as bad as that sounds, I kind of liked the patriotism…though today, I would hate to lose my Toyota.
This all said, there is “fault” on both sides of this current argument/strike…including corporate greed AND union BS.
You obviously have not been in a car plant lately- every job is optimized for 56/60 seconds- many jobs can not be completed in the allotted time if the “mix” of vehicles is not correct.
It has been several years, but when I’ve last been in a plant is irrelevant. I was talking about the old Lordstown plant that has been closed for several years now, not current plants.
AEZ.
I don’t know what happened in the past there but, you obviously were not in that plant for many years. Since 2009 and after, things were complete opposite of your old stories. I was there. I made that sign ‘The Last Cruze’ that is in this article. I lived thru the lies that Mary Barra and Gerald Johnson spewed to get their massive payoffs. Employees at that time we’re doing good jobs and what management instructed. The union was not the great power it was.
GM screwed many people. I hope Mary and the rest of them burn in eternity for their greed and lies.
On thing that I will always remember.
When the announcement that we were unallocated happened. Part of me though that people would damage cars or cause problems. I NEVER happened.
Employees did a great job for the last few months until the last car.
Your old stories are just old stories.
I’m not trying to argue what you are saying…I left the area in ‘98, so yes they are old stories. I was only sharing my perspective for anyone interested, and I don’t have any knowledge of the Cruze years. Obviously we’re talking about two completely different time periods.
And lastly, we’re on the same page re: GM mgmt.
GM had been wanting to get rid of that plant for decades by the time they finally closed it. It had massive capacity for something like several hundreds thousand vehicles a year, which partly explains why every division back in the 80s had a version of that J car.
But it’s not easy to close a plant like that, as everyone could see when GM finally decided to pull the plug on it. Hell, we’re still talking about it.
But GM just isn’t the dominant force in our market anymore, and you can’t seriously expect them to maintain the production capacity that they used to need if you want them to stay in business.
2017 was a bad year for Cruze production. But it was a great discounted buy for me!
Yup 2$ gasoline was very bad for the Cruze- today people would be lines up for a mile to get a nee one. Gen 1 s were incredible.