UAW president defends Trump tariffs in verbal slugfest with befuddled MSNBC hosts

United Auto Workers (UAW) President Shawn Fain engaged in an 11-minute verbal battle with MSNBC hosts Alicia Menendez, Symone Sanders-Townsend, and Michael Steele on Sunday over tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump.

Trump announced reciprocal tariffs to address import duties and “horrendous imbalances” in trade with other countries during an April 2 Rose Garden event a week after he imposed a 25% tariff covering imported cars, SUVs, crossovers, minivans and light trucks, in addition to parts including engines and transmissions, citing “national security concerns.” Fain, who had been critical of Trump during the 2024 presidential campaign, said the tariffs would provide an incentive for jobs to return to the United States.

“Now, we’ve been very clear,” Fain said. “We do believe, and we know, when it comes to auto, when it comes to heavy truck, and agricultural implementation, we know that tariffs will influence these companies to do the right thing and reinvest in this country and reinvest in factories in this country.”

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“At the end of the day, we believe that Stellantis and these companies will bring work back because of these tariffs,” Fain added later.

While the leadership of the UAW backed then-Vice President Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election — Fain even labeled Trump a “scab” during the Democratic National Convention — many rank-and-file members of the union backed Trump.

“Since NAFTA’s inception in 1993, we’ve lost 90,000 manufacturing facilities in this country. Millions of jobs, and these weren’t, you know, low-end jobs. These were jobs that paid decent wages, had good benefits, retirement security-” Fain said before Sanders-Townsend interrupted him.

“But here’s my thing… NAFTA was 30 years ago. The situation that we are dealing with right now, and I agree with you, I’m on the side of the folks that said they… did the American workers wrong, absolutely,” Sanders-Townsend said. “But right now we are dealing with a situation where it’s not — these are blanket tariffs. We are dealing with a situation where manufacturing is not going to come back in two weeks. So what? How, I’m just, I’m really struggling to figure to understand how UAW has aligned itself with Trump on this.”

Trump campaigned on imposing tariffs to help boost manufacturing in the United States. After co-host Michael Steele questioned whether the tariffs could create jobs, Fain responded.

“NAFTA is still causing us to lose jobs in this country. Our broken trade system is still causing us to lose jobs in this country, and no one from either party has been willing to even address the issue for 30 plus years. That’s the first thing,” Fain said. “And we support tariffs as a tool, a tool in the toolbox, not the end-all be-all. We got to fix the broken trade system. But tariffs are a motivator to make these companies do the right thing.”

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