From Fortune:

President Joe Biden received an endorsement from the United Auto Workers union, a critical boost for his efforts to win support in blue-collar swing states like Michigan and Wisconsin. The important endorsement came as the Democratic president addressed the union’s crowd during their three-day gathering in Washington, where they charted their political priorities.

The event followed Tuesday’s primary vote in New Hampshire, where Republican front-runner Donald Trump cemented his hold on core Republican voters with a victory and Biden scored a write-in win. President Biden has positioned himself as the most labor-friendly leader in American history, going so far as appearing on a picket line with union workers at a GM parts warehouse in the Detroit area during a strike last fall.

Union president Shawn Fain, who had demurred earlier, said Biden had earned the endorsement, contrasting the president’s obvious support with Trump’s trash talk and anti-union stance. But when UAW went on strike against GM in 2019, then-President Trump was silent. Fain called Trump a “scab,” a derogatory term for workers who cross union picket lines and work during a strike.

The president has been working to cut into Trump’s advantage with white voters who don’t have a college degree. “The days of working people being dealt out of a deal are over in this country as long as I’m president,” Biden declared to the cheering crowd.

The UAW, with around 380,000 members, is one of the last unions to endorse presidential candidates. In 2020, the union didn’t endorse Biden until April 21. Internal UAW polling shows that by Election Day, members and UAW retirees usually vote 60% Democratic. The endorsement may sway non-union blue-collar white males who have been voting more for Republicans than in the past.

Some members have varied views on Biden, with support ranging from enthusiastic to uncertainty about whether to vote on Election Day. The union president has been careful to ensure the members had a say in the endorsement process following a bribery and embezzlement scandal that led to two union presidents serving prison time.

Johannah King-Slutzky, a Columbia University graduate student and union member within the UAW, expressed her dissent during the speech, saying “he has not acted with urgency to stop the genocide in Gaza.” The union called for a ceasefire in December.

Biden’s support for Israel in its war against Hamas in Gaza may have caused dissent among some younger members in the union. Despite some disagreement, the endorsement signifies an important boost to Biden’s reelection bid as he seeks to sway blue-collar workers in critical auto-making swing states such as Michigan and Wisconsin.



Read more: UAW endorses Biden, Fain says Trump ‘doesn’t care about the American worker’