Harris and Biden will make their first joint appearance on the campaign trail in Pittsburgh

Victor Boolen

Harris and Biden will make their first joint appearance on the campaign trail in Pittsburgh

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Joe Biden and Kamala Harris made their first post-convention appearance together on the presidential campaign trail on Monday, celebrating Labor Day honoring union workers in Pittsburgh.

“We are so proud to be the most pro-union administration in American history,” Harris said. “I love Labor Day. I love celebrating Labor Day, and Pittsburgh is the cradle of the American labor movement.

Between comments about the administration’s support for organized labor and Donald Trump’s attacks on labor organizing, Vice President Harris spoke out against Nippon Steel’s pending purchase of US Steel and argued that the iconic Pennsylvania steel company should remain in American hands. owners.

“US Steel is a historic American company, and maintaining strong American steel companies is vital to our nation. And I couldn’t agree more with President Biden: US Steel should remain American-owned and American-operated.

Related: Kamala Harris defends policy and shares office plan in first major interview

The United Steelworkers union, which represents about 10,000 U.S. Steel workers, opposes the $14.9 billion deal and questions Nippon Steel’s alleged violations of the union’s rights regarding a change of control under a four-year basic labor agreement signed in 2022. The trade union and the companies are in arbitration negotiations.

Harris again expressed his support for the Protecting the Right to Organization Act, a broad basket of labor reforms that would encourage unionization.

Kenny Cooper, president of the IBEW union, introduced Biden and Harris, noting that passage of the Butch Lewis Act on Harris’ vote saved the benefits of two million union members. “They were bound for one reason only,” he said. “We couldn’t find a Republican senator.”

Harris also voted in favor of the Inflation Relief Act, which USW International president David McCall said in comments “has revolutionized the cement, chemical, glass and steel sectors, among other traditional core industries.”

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump also opposes the Nippon Steel deal and has said he will block it if the president. Biden announced his opposition to the Nippon Steel deal in March.

Perhaps less pointedly than Harris, Biden described his administration’s accomplishments in Pennsylvania, from clean energy investments to infrastructure money. He noted that his administration required project labor contracts that respected workers’ rights and demanded American products, while reminding listeners that Donald Trump appointed union-busting officials to the National Labor Relations Board.

“Wall Street didn’t build America,” Biden said. “The middle class built America and the unions built the middle class.”

Biden and Harris appearing together gives a glimpse of how they might campaign in the waning days of the election. Biden describes Harris as “the backbone of a ram and the moral compass of a saint.”

Harris spent the morning in Detroit extolling the virtues of union organizing — the five-day work week, sick leave, vacation time and other benefits — with Northwestern High School labor leaders.

“We celebrate unions because unions helped build America, and unions helped build the American middle class,” he said. “When union wages go up, everyone’s wages go up.”

Biden will be the first sitting president to walk the union line, supporting the United Auto Workers in their dispute with the major automakers in September 2023. “You — the UAW — saved the auto industry in 2008 and before that,” Biden shouted through a bullhorn on the Michigan warning line. “You made a lot of sacrifices, you gave up a lot. Companies were in trouble. Now they are doing incredibly well and guess what? You should do incredibly well too.”

UAW President Shawn Fain has been both a strident voice reviving the American labor movement and a staunch opponent of Trump. “Donald Trump is all talk, and Kamala Harris is walking the walk,” Fain said at the Democratic National Convention in August, wearing a shirt that read “Trump is a scab.” Harris supporters chanted that phrase in Detroit this morning.

While Trump called for Fain’s “immediate firing” during his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention, the Republican nominee has opened up to working-class voters in his bid to be reinstated. The renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement and his proposed tariffs of 10 to 20 percent on foreign trade have been central to his outreach, which he argues will bring production back from offshore facilities.

But Project 2025 – a conservative playbook written by the Heritage Foundation for another Trump administration – aims to end merit-based employment for thousands of federal workers; calls for changes to “protected collective action” that would allow employers to more easily retaliate against unionization; and to eliminate the “persuader’s rule,” which requires companies to disclose when hiring union-busting consultants.

Trump has also been dismissive of the electric car industry in his public comments, initially calling for an end to electric car mandates but recently returning to that rhetoric after Tesla CEO Elon Musk endorsed his candidacy. In an interview on Musk’s X/Twitter social media site, Trump blasted Musk’s approach to working relationships.

“They’re going on strike,” Trump said. “I won’t name the company, but they go on strike and you say, ‘That’s OK.’ You’re all out. You’re all out. So every one of you is out, and you’re the biggest.”

That prompted Teamsters President Sean O’Brien — who spoke at the RNC convention to the surprise of many labor leaders — to walk his own overtures toward Trump back. “Firing workers for organizing, striking and exercising their rights as Americans is economic terrorism,” O’Brien said.

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