The president aims to strengthen the union. The former president hopes to appeal to the workers.
That’s a subtle change but, combined with the decline in the density of men in unions, we see that the percentage of White men among union members has fallen from about 50 percent to about 2 in 5.
The labor movement, in other words, is increasingly made up of women and people of color, groups that are less likely to be swayed by Trump’s pitch.Biden’s trip to Michigan will center not on a campaign speech but on a visit to the picket line of the striking United Auto Workers members. It’s an unusual action for a president to take but one in keeping with Biden’s presentation of himself as labor’s greatest White House ally in recent memory.
Biden seems to genuinely believe in the importance of the institutional power of labor unions, but there’s a political benefit his party has enjoyed, too. Unions regularly give far more in campaign contributions to Democratic candidates than to Republicans, for example, a demonstration of the alliance between labor and the Democratic Party.
Unions provide more than money, of course. They endorse candidates and encourage or incentivize union members to volunteer for campaigns. They turn out votes. This is harder and less effective than it used to be — as shown in that Gallup graph, above — but it is still effective. Labor unions see the Democratic Party as an ally in its efforts to win fights against management; the party sees labor as an ally in winning elections. There’s a symbiosis between the two institutional power centers.
So, yes, both candidates are going to Michigan. But while there they will prioritize very different actions with very different ends.
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