[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 152 (Wednesday, September 20, 2023)]
[House]
[Pages H4433-H4436]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          SOLIDARITY WITH UAW

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 9, 2023, the gentlewoman from Washington (Ms. Jayapal) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.


                             General Leave

  Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks 
and submit extraneous material in the Record.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentlewoman from Washington?
  There was no objection.
  Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, we have seen workers standing up to 
corporate greed and fighting for better rights on the job, good 
benefits, and fair wages.
  Today, our Congressional Progressive Caucus Special Order hour is 
devoted to this topic and to our solidarity with striking workers at 
UAW plants across the country.
  This week, the United Auto Workers authorized a strike. As a long-
term organizer myself, and as the chair of our 103-member strong 
Congressional Progressive Caucus, a caucus that has been at the center 
of championing labor issues, I am proud to stand in solidarity with the 
nearly 150,000 United Auto Workers across the country.
  Let me start today by thanking all the workers who have had the 
courage to organize, the courage to use their collective power to stand 
up for better pay, cost-of-living adjustments, increased job security, 
and many other critical benefits that they deserve to live with 
dignity.
  Unionization is fundamentally about workplace democracy, about the 
engagement and the priorities of workers; your benefits, your hours, 
your pay, your priorities. Nobody tells you what those are except the 
workers themselves.
  UAW workers are showing us what it means to have collective power to 
stand together and to demand better.
  Over the last decade, CEOs at the Big Three automakers have seen 
their salaries skyrocket by 40 percent, and these companies have made 
close to $250 billion in profits over the last decade.
  Let me just say that again: A quarter of a trillion dollars in profit 
for these three automakers, while workers in the auto manufacturing 
industry have actually seen their wages drop by more than 20 percent 
when adjusted for inflation.
  Just listen to these numbers.
  At Ford, the CEO makes 281 times that wage of the median worker.
  At General Motors, the ratio is 362 to 1, and at Stellantis, which 
makes Chrysler, Jeep, and Ram, the ratio is 365 to 1.
  Do these CEOs work hundreds of times harder than their lowest paid 
workers?
  The answer is, there is nothing at these companies without the 
workers. There would be no profits without these workers. Why is it 
that they cannot share in the profits in an equitable way?
  It is workers who have built the successes of these companies and led 
them to these record profits. Yet, these same workers have reported 
being forced to work 12-hour shifts for 90 days straight without a 
single day off. That is just unconscionable.
  It is unacceptable for these CEOs to be raking in multimillion-dollar 
salaries while their workers are forced to strike for the pay raises 
and the benefits they should be entitled to.

                              {time}  1515

  UAW has been clear about their demands for months. We are in this 
situation because the Big Three automakers, their CEOs, have refused to 
even come to the table in meeting workers' demands halfway. These 
companies need to come to the bargaining table in good faith. They 
cannot expect workers to continue working unreasonable hours without 
job security to make cars that they cannot even buy.
  In spite of the failure of the Big Three to grant workers' demands, 
the unionization movement is not slowing down. When their contract 
expired on Thursday, September 14, UAW president Shawn Fain announced 
initial strikes at three plants that include nearly 13,000 workers. 
Still awaiting a fair contract, a new strike deadline of this Friday, 
September 22, at noon has been announced if Ford, General Motors, or 
Stellantis haven't made progress toward a new agreement.
  Many of these CEOs frame UAW's demands as unreasonable, but let me be 
clear about something. Labor costs make up only about 5 percent of the 
costs that goes into a vehicle. These companies could raise worker 
wages to the levels they are asking without raising costs to consumers 
and still rake in billions in profits.
  Let's not forget who stepped up and sacrificed during the recession. 
These companies actually got billions of dollars in taxpayer bailouts, 
and autoworkers were the ones who took life-changing cuts to benefits 
and wages just to keep the industry alive because they cared about that 
industry.
  For the Big Three, this is a huge opportunity to lead and to repay 
the American taxpayers and the autoworkers who made the sacrifices to 
keep those companies afloat.
  These big corporations should be standing with instead of against the 
very workers who built their companies from the bottom up, and any 
management that says otherwise does not understand what workplace 
democracy means.
  It is clear that President Biden understands what is at stake. He 
just recently said--and it is quite unprecedented for a President to 
say this--the Big Three ``should go further to ensure record corporate 
profits mean record contracts for the UAW.''
  We agree. House Democrats in the Congressional Progressive Caucus 
understand this, too. That is why we in the House have passed the PRO 
Act multiple times, despite it dying in the Senate because of a Jim 
Crow legacy filibuster.
  That is why we are bringing manufacturing union jobs to America in 
every corner of this country. Unions keep our economy strong. They 
protect our workers. The power to come together and organize is so 
important, and it is a right that I will always defend in Congress.
  As workers at UAW and other unions across the country push for fair 
pay and better benefits, we at the Congressional Progressive Caucus, we 
in the Democratic Caucus, will be standing with them in solidarity 
today, tomorrow, and forever.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Meng), who 
has been a champion for labor issues and of justice in general.
  Ms. MENG. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to stand in solidarity and speak 
in support of our autoworkers who are currently on strike.
  Working men and women are the backbone of this Nation, and their 
desire for job security, for fair wages, and to simply be treated 
fairly is something that every working individual deserves.
  During the 2008 great financial crisis, these workers sacrificed pay 
and benefits during a time of desperation to help keep their companies 
afloat. Now, long after these corporations have bounced back, they are 
making record profits that they refuse to share with their own workers. 
That is unacceptable and wrong.
  These workers have ensured that key industries that make our country 
run stay functioning. In return for the billions that they have 
generated, all

[[Page H4434]]

they want are wages and benefits commensurate with their company's 
success. That seems fair to me.
  I am proud to stand alongside the thousands of autoworkers that this 
contract covers, and I hope an agreement is reached soon.
  Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Michigan 
(Mrs. Dingell), a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus 
executive board who has really been on the front lines of this fight, 
who has been telling us for months that we need to pay attention to 
this, and who has been fighting at every turn for workers.
  Mrs. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to stand in solidarity with 
our UAW workers. I have seen many negotiations in my lifetime, but 
these are the most important I have ever witnessed, and I am likely to, 
in my career.
  The industry is at a crossroads, and quite frankly, the domestic auto 
industry's future is at stake.
  We must manufacture electric vehicles here in America to stay at the 
forefront of innovation and technology in the world. We are competing 
in a global marketplace, and these workers are critical to it. They are 
the backbone of the American economy.
  This is not a talking point moment. This is where the rubber is 
meeting the road.
  Too many people are trying to make this an either/or, that you can 
protect the environment or you can protect the worker, but you can't do 
both. We can and must do both.
  There are a lot of important issues on the table right now, but let's 
talk about the autoworkers. This industry was near bankruptcy in 2008 
and 2009, quite frankly, because of poor management decisions. Nobody 
wanted to see the auto industry go bankrupt, so the workers stepped up 
and said they will give up their cost-of-living adjustment to help save 
this industry.
  In reality though, it is 2023, and those workers' wages in real terms 
are 10 percent less than what they were making in 2008 and 2009. They 
just want their wages to keep up with inflation.
  Workers need to be able to support their families. I have talked to 
these workers. I am in their halls. I am not just going because 
suddenly there is a strike. I am in a union hall every single weekend. 
These workers are working overtime shifts just to support their 
families.

  It is not fair that someone is a temporary worker for 8 to 10 years 
and is not making benefits. It is not right that someone is on the line 
doing the exact same job somebody else is doing but being paid less 
because they are a different tier.
  Everybody in our country benefits when our workers are paid well and 
paid their value. Autoworkers deserve a decent wage and benefits. By 
the way, when they do well, it raises all people's wages.
  We cannot forget that there are many things that we enjoy today, like 
a 40-hour workweek, benefits, sick days, pensions, nurse-to-patient 
ratios, teacher-to-student ratios, safe working conditions, that were 
negotiated by a union so that we would all benefit.
  I want a competitive auto industry. I am not going to let China or 
any other country beat us. I am going to work hard for a competitive 
auto industry. We need to make sure, as the industry goes through this 
transition, that we are protecting the workers, that their livelihoods 
are safe and they are not left behind.
  Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, before the gentlewoman leaves, I would 
engage in a colloquy with her for a couple of minutes.
  I know she has been on the picket lines with workers. She has talked 
to striking workers. Can she tell us some of what she is hearing about 
what people have been giving up, just in terms of their own security, 
their own ability to take care of their families?
  Mrs. DINGELL. Will the gentlewoman yield?
  Ms. JAYAPAL. I yield to the gentlewoman from Michigan.
  Mrs. DINGELL. Mr. Speaker, as I said, the workers were telling me in 
the halls this weekend how much overtime they have been working just to 
keep up, but there also have been chemical spills that are happening in 
nonunion plants. We have to talk to the occupational health and safety 
people about what is happening. There are people who are worried.
  I mean, there really are workers who have been temporary, so they are 
getting paid, but they are not getting any benefits. There are a lot of 
issues.
  By the way, they don't want to see the companies destroyed. They need 
a competitive auto company so their jobs are safe. What they want is 
just to be paid a fair wage for the work that they are doing.
  Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman so much for her 
leadership, and I thank her for sharing that.
  I think it is really important to remember that these are the workers 
who actually saved the auto industry by giving up defined benefit 
pension plans, by giving up salary increases, wage increases, benefit 
increases at that very time when we needed them to because they care so 
much about making sure that we have a competitive auto industry. I know 
that that has been everything that the gentlewoman has worked for, as 
well.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Mrs. Ramirez), 
who is also on our executive board for the Congressional Progressive 
Caucus and also has been a champion for workers and for justice 
throughout her career. We are so delighted she is now here in Congress 
to do that work.
  Mrs. RAMIREZ. Mr. Speaker, today, earlier in committee, we were 
talking about the economy and talking about numbers, so I want to 
continue the conversation on numbers.
  Approximately $25 million, that is the amount reported that was 
earned by the Stellantis CEO in 2022, which is a 77 percent increase 
over the former CEO's salary in 2019.
  Nearly $21 million is the reported earnings of the Ford CEO, and that 
was up 21 percent from the salary of the former CEO in 2019.
  Approximately $30 million is the paycheck of General Motors' CEO, 
which is an increase of 34 percent compared to 2019.
  Not long ago, a CEO defended their paycheck by saying, ``Ninety-two 
percent of it is based on performance of the company.''
  You see, I, too, believe that when a company does great financially, 
the ones who worked to make it a reality should see the fruits of their 
efforts.
  When we say that a record-high salary raise is due to the record-high 
performance of a company, we should ask ourselves: How was that 
performance made possible?
  The truth is that there is only one answer. The answer is that nearly 
150,000 United Auto Workers who are out on the streets today urging 
these companies for parity are the reason for this performance. They 
are urging their companies for their earned benefits. They are urging 
their companies for stronger protection and a place in the industry's 
future, the clean energy economy.
  Mr. Speaker, as the proud daughter of hardworking immigrant parents 
who worked long hours at minimum wage jobs--my mother still today a 
home care worker--which they did just to put food on our table, a roof 
over our heads, and keep the lights on, it is my honor to stand here in 
full support of UAW workers and every single worker fighting for their 
future. Workers are the backbone of our middle class and our economy, 
and we know that when they thrive, we all thrive.
  Time and time again, workers are demonstrating to us that the power 
we hold when we come together to bargain for better wages, benefits, 
and working conditions is a benefit for all of us. I know that we will 
succeed again.
  Today, I stand with autoworkers in their fight to secure the contract 
that they deserve. It is time that we give our autoworkers the parity 
and support they need and have already earned.
  Know that in me you will always find someone who stands ready to 
protect and support all workers' rights to fair wages, safe and 
dignified working conditions, universal healthcare, and democracy in 
the workplace. It is what the Congressional Progressive Caucus stands 
for. It is what I stand for. It is why I am so honored to be able to 
speak today in this Special Order hour.
  Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California 
(Mr. DeSaulnier), a colleague who serves on the Education and the 
Workforce Committee with me and has been, again, at the forefront of 
championing labor issues.

[[Page H4435]]

  


                              {time}  1530

  Mr. DeSAULNIER. Mr. Speaker, today, I stand in solidarity with my 
colleagues and the 150,000 members of the United Auto Workers fighting 
for fair pay and safer working conditions. In high cost-of-living 
areas, like the area I represent, the bay area, cost-of-living 
adjustments are necessary to ensure that workers have a livable 
standard in their community with their job.
  Over the past decade, the Big Three automakers almost doubled their 
profits, much of it with the help from the United States Government. 
These profits totaled $250 billion. The CEOs' pay increased almost 40 
percent just in the last 4 years. Unfortunately, pay for the workers 
hasn't come near to following suit. Though the strikes are currently 
ongoing in three States, their outcome will have impacts on and provide 
benefits to the quality of life for autoworkers across the country.
  As a member of both the House Committee on Transportation and 
Infrastructure and the Committee on Education and the Workforce, I am 
especially aware of the implications these negotiations will have on 
the electric vehicle transition. As a former union member myself, I 
believe we need to ensure strong labor protections for this new and 
fast-growing industry which provides a historic opportunity to both 
support workers and provide for a just and sustainable economic 
transition.
  I thank the UAW members for their sacrifice and their commitment. I 
thank them nationwide for standing up for what is right, and what is 
right not just for their members but for the future of this country.
  Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, I thank Representative DeSaulnier for his 
comments.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. 
Velazquez), the ranking member of the Small Business Committee and a 
member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus executive board, 
somebody who has truly seen around the world the plight of workers and 
the need for justice.
  Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in solidarity with UAW 
members across the country fighting for a fair contract.
  As we stand here today, over 12,000 autoworkers are striking in 
Michigan, Missouri, and Ohio. Over 100,000 more UAW stand ready to do 
what is necessary to secure better wages, benefits, and working 
conditions. Their priorities are not extreme.
  In the past decade, the Big Three automakers made an astronomical 
$250 billion in profits. During that same time, CEO pay at these 
companies has increased 40 percent while workers' wages have increased 
only 6 percent. These record profits were built on the backs of 
workers.
  Today, UAW members are demanding that they receive their fair share 
of this record windfall. This is not extreme. It is what these workers 
are entitled to.
  The Big Three automakers must recognize this and negotiate with UAW 
in good faith to resolve the standoff with justice and fairness.
  Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, I will take a minute, just in case anybody 
who is out there listening has been interested in the concept of 
strikes.
  I think it is important to say that striking is not an inherently bad 
or inherently good thing. It is not a failure of our system. In fact, 
it is a tool that is used to rebalance power between employers and 
workers.
  Employers don't have any right to pay unsustainable wages. They don't 
have any right to put forward unsustainable benefits. They don't have a 
right to keep families unstable by filling their workforce with workers 
that they just name as temporary, even though sometimes they work for 8 
or 10 years. They don't have any right to put the burden of a worker's 
retirement on families or on governments, particularly when so many of 
these autoworkers have spent generations working for these companies 
and building these companies. Employers have no such rights.
  Striking is actually the noble way that workers can reset the power 
dynamic so that they and their families can get what they deserve. They 
make the decision to strike very soberly. If you listen to many of the 
autoworkers that are on the picket lines today, they talk about how 
they have been saving, preparing for this moment. They have not been 
going to movies. They have not been spending on things that they might 
otherwise spend on, because they know that in striking, what they are 
doing is fighting not only for their wages and benefits and working 
conditions, they are actually fighting for the wages, the benefits, and 
the working conditions of generations of workers to come, perhaps even 
their sons, their daughters, their children, their grandchildren, to be 
able to have good jobs.
  I think that is a really important thing to think about. For us, our 
job, I think, is as a community of those workers to support that 
decision, especially when inequality is hurting our society so badly.
  Here in Congress, I think our job as Members of Congress is to make 
sure that we strengthen the right to collectively bargain and to 
organize, to make sure that workers have that power, to work with 
management.
  In many parts of the world, it is not an adversarial relationship, 
and it is not an adversarial relationship because both management and 
workers understand that a company can do better when management 
supports workers, when workers are paid well. Of course, by the way, 
when workers' wages go up, they spend more. When they spend more, their 
communities do better, their businesses do better, and everyone does 
better.
  The tragedy of the last many decades really, accompanied by policy 
that has forced these changes, is that trickle-down economics doesn't 
work. What actually happens in trickle-down economics is a few people 
at the very top get rich and everybody else loses out. That is why we 
have the highest inequality in our country in half a century. It is why 
not just income inequality, but wealth inequality is at its highest. It 
is why in the wealthiest country in the world, we have 130 million 
people who are poor and low wage.
  When workers are striking, it is a reflection, a consequence of bad 
policy choices that have not furthered the goal of equity and equality 
and fairness, and it is also a rebalancing of power.
  I was interested, so as I was thinking about this Special Order hour, 
I looked up how many strikes we have seen recently. Just since the 
beginning of this year, there have been 247 strikes so far that involve 
341,000 workers.
  When you look at what has happened out of some of the big contracts 
we have seen, from the port contracts to the graduate students and the 
research students in my home State of Washington, the UPS workers, what 
you are finally seeing with collective bargaining is the ability to 
move wages in the right direction. Of course, if that doesn't happen, 
then the tool of a strike is always on the table as a way to force 
people to listen to the demands of workers.
  I think today, as we think about the situation that we are in, 
everybody understands how important the auto industry is to us in this 
country. We all understand that we have competition from other 
countries around the world and that the way that we are going to make 
sure that we keep our industry strong is to bring back manufacturing to 
the United States. That is exactly what Democrats and President Biden 
have been pushing for with the bipartisan infrastructure bill, with the 
Inflation Reduction Act, with all of the bills that we have passed, 
with the CHIPS and Science Act.
  The reality is that we are trying to bring back jobs to the United 
States and to make sure that they are good union jobs. Unfortunately, 
there are people who are cynically using the UAW strike to try to say 
that they stand up for workers, like our former President. He is saying 
that he is going to go to Michigan, he is going to suddenly appear to 
speak to the autoworkers. I would just remind anybody who is watching 
that under the former President, we lost hundreds of thousands of jobs 
that were offshored. We didn't make the American economy more 
competitive. We didn't bring back good union jobs.
  In fact, my colleagues across the aisle have opposed us almost 
unanimously. We have some Republicans who have stuck with us on the PRO 
Act to advance collective bargaining. We have tried to move forward 
increases to the minimum wage. We have done all of the things on the 
Democratic side with very little, if any, Republican support, depending 
on the bill,

[[Page H4436]]

to make sure that we are strengthening the middle class and the bottom, 
creating a bottom-up and middle-out economy that benefits all of us.
  Nobody is against people earning profits. What is wrong is to earn 
those profits at the cost of the workers who actually make those 
profits for you. That is wrong. That is why we are so proud to stand in 
solidarity with the autoworkers, with the United Auto Workers.
  We thank the president, Shawn Fain for his strength of negotiating 
and for his clarity of vision, for his moral call for everybody to do 
better, because when everybody does better, everybody does better. When 
only a few people at the very top do better, everyone suffers.
  Mr. Speaker, I hope that the striking autoworkers across the country 
know that the Congressional Progressive Caucus and that House Democrats 
stand with them in this very difficult time. We promise that we will 
continue to protect workers, to protect collective bargaining, to 
expand collective bargaining, and to make sure that workers everywhere 
enjoy the rights and the dignity that they deserve.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________