Hawley meets with autoworker union ‘looking for partners’

Republican Sen. Josh Hawley met with United Automobile Workers president Shawn Fain on Wednesday to discuss working together on pro-labor priorities, his latest bid to build the party’s union ties.

The Missourian, who is circulating a framework for pro-labor policymaking among his GOP colleagues and has joined picket lines for the UAW as well as other workers, met with Fain and other UAW leaders at their request on Wednesday. They discussed tariffs, Hawley’s proposed labor legislation and how the massive labor group can work with the new GOP-controlled Washington while Hawley and other Republicans try to become more pro-union.

“Their attitude is interesting. They realize that Donald Trump has won the White House. They don’t want to be shut out for the next four years. They want to actually see something happen. And so, I think they are looking for partners,” Hawley told Semafor on Thursday.

Hawley is beginning to circulate legislation that would force an end to employers’ stalling techniques after workers vote to join a union. He wants to capitalize on Trump’s inroads with working-class voters in a Republican Party that’s been historically skeptical or downright hostile to unions and their leaders.

There are already signs that identity is changing: The Teamsters were neutral in the presidential race, and their president spoke at the Republican National Convention. Hawley said “we are getting good traction on our initial efforts here on labor reform.”

Still, the UAW endorsed Kamala Harris for president, and the AFL-CIO is leading a major campaign against the Trump administration’s efforts to cut federal spending. Hawley said the UAW leaders told him multiple times that they’re not affiliated with one party and “seemed at pains to dispel” the notion that they’re a political organization supporting Democrats.

“They’re the ones who brought up tariffs. That’s where they started with — Trump’s tariffs, and they liked it. So I read all that as: they want to be relevant,” Hawley said. “It’s a good thing for my Republican colleagues to see that labor will work with you if you will do something that’s good for working people.”

In the Missouri senator’s telling, the UAW leaders said they supported Trump’s goal of using tariffs to move auto manufacturing back to the United States from Mexico. He also said UAW leaders support his legislative framework on labor and want to help create a bipartisan coalition to pass pro-union legislation.

It won’t be easy to convince Republican leaders to back such an effort. But Hawley said he sees a huge political upside to acting on a labor bill during Trump’s second term.

“We could be a working-class party, but we have to deliver. And we’ve got a chance now, with the most pro-labor Republican president of my lifetime,” Hawley said. “That’s my message to my fellow Republicans.”