(WASHINGTON, D.C.) - In a rousing speech made to 3,000 Union Activists meeting in Washington, D.C., United Auto Worker (UAW) President Shawn Fain set out a four-item agenda for their annual Legislative/Political Conference: Campaigning for adequate wages; Adequate and guaranteed pensions and retirement security, Medicare For All and the right of Workers to “take time off from the job so they can have a life.”

He also repeatedly blasted the greed of the 1%, including their leader: Republican President Donald Trump who Fain called a dictator.

U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (Democrat-New York) later added “fascist.”

Fain led a parade of speakers from the UAW and from the outside to the podium before the Convention Delegates headed out for the rest of the week of February 9th to lobby lawmakers for those causes.

He warned Delegates that “what is won at the bargaining table can be taken away at the ballot box” by corporate-funded politicians of both parties: “Corporate America wants every last penny of value that we create” in the Car Plants, Farm Implement Plants and other companies UAW Members toil in.

Fain also reminded the crowd that the legendary UAW Leader Walter Reuther said “the purpose of the UAW and the Labor Movement is to change society for the better.”

By contrast, “The top one-percent have as much wealth as the bottom ninety-five-percent of the country,” Fain declared.

The UAW’s mandate is to lead the Nation to change that imbalance, he avowed.

That 1% also can be forced to respond to public pressure, said Fain - who gave two examples, then urged the Delegates to mobilize their Members when they return home to provide that pressure, especially in an election year.

One was after UAW won big raises in its StandUP! rolling Strike against the Big Three Automakers - Ford, GM, and Stellantis (formerly FiatChrysler).

Foreign “transplant” Automakers raised their pay, too, he said. 

And when Fast Food Workers walked out nationwide or left for better-paying jobs during the Coronavirus Pandemic, even bottom-payers such as McDonald’s and Burger King “started paying workers ($20 to $25) an hour.”

To Continue Reading This Labor News Report, Go To: UAW’s Fain sets agenda for political activists – People's World

Photo Courtesy Of The UAW's Facebook Page.