Sean O’Brien, president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, joined other union labor bosses in criticizing former President Donald Trump for his suggestion during an interview with Elon Musk that striking workers should be fired.
What exactly did Trump say?
During Monday’s interview, Trump praised Musk for firing workers who went on strike.
“They go on strike, I won’t mention the name of the company, but they go on strike and you say, ‘All right, you’re all gone,’” Trump said. “You are all gone. Then each one of you is gone.”
It’s unclear which of Musk’s companies Trump was referring to.
What was O’Brien’s response?
“Firing workers for organizing, striking and exercising their rights as Americans is economic terrorism,” O’Brien said in a statement Tuesday night.
O’Brien sparked controversy last month when he spoke at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, becoming the first Teamsters president to do so. But the International Brotherhood of Teamsters has yet to endorse a presidential candidate this cycle.
How did other unions react?
The United Auto Workers union has filed an unfair labor practice charge against the Trump campaign and Musk, Tesla’s billionaire chief executive.
“Both Trump and Musk want the working class to sit down and shut up, and they openly laugh about it,” UAW President Shawn Fain said in a statement. “It’s disgusting, illegal and completely predictable for these two clowns.”
Harris gets union support
However, most of America’s major labor organizations supported Harris.
Among them:
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Automotive Workers United
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UNITE
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AFL-CIO
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American Federation of Teachers
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Service Employees International Union
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United Food and Commercial Workers
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Communications Workers of America
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American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees
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United Farm Workers
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International Union of Painters and Allied Trades
The truck drivers union has not yet endorsed a candidate
-O’Brien said the Teamsters would make a formal endorsement after next week’s Democratic National Convention (DNC) – and after conducting an online survey of their rank-and-file members.
On Tuesday, the National Black Caucus of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (or TNBC) voted unanimously to support Vice President Kamala Harris – putting pressure on its parent union to follow suit.
“When people show you who they are, believe them and Trump has shown us for 40 years who he really is: someone who is not for us,” TNBC President James Curbeam said in a statement. “Supporting a candidate’s story would be a betrayal of the values we fight to defend.”
A spokesperson for O’Brien told CNN that he requested speaking engagements at the conventions of both parties. The DNC, so far, has not responded to his request.
Biden made history by joining a picket
Before President Biden dropped out of the race, he made a point of showing his support for union labor.
In September, Biden joined striking members of the United Auto Workers union outside a General Motors facility in Michigan, becoming the first sitting president to participate in a picket.
Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, is also trying to appeal to unions. At a rally in Los Angeles earlier this week for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, Walz stated that he was the “first trade unionist on a presidential ticket since Ronald Reagan.”
That’s not entirely true: Trump was a member of the Screen Actors Guild when he was at the top of the Republican ticket in 2016 and 2020, before resigning in 2021.
Trump has been endorsed by the Border Patrol union in the last 2 cycles
Trump has the support of at least one union: The National Border Patrol Council — which represents more than 18,000 Border Patrol agents — endorsed him in 2016 and 2020. And while it has yet to issue a formal endorsement of Trump in 2024, the union issued a statement after Biden falsely claimed at the Atlanta debate that he had endorsed him.
“To be clear, we have never and will never support Biden,” the union said in a statement published on X.
