Meanwhile, Stellantis has announced massive temporary layoffs of 900 hourly workers at five Midwest plants in the U.S. The company is still coming to terms with the impact of new tariffs that recently went into effect. Consequently, they have stopped production at all six of their Canadian and Mexican assembly plants. The plants slated to be impacted are the Warren Stamping plant and Sterling Stamping Plant, both located in Michigan. Along with the Indiana Transmission Plant, Kokomo Transmission Plant and Kokomo Casting Plant in Kokomo, Indiana are affected.
The union contract protects most of these workers at these plants from losing pay immediately during layoff. They have an amazing safety net that protects their income. A number of labor advocates expressed shock at the ruling. Union leaders are alarmed by what it indicates for the future of workers’ livelihoods.
Antonio Filosa, Stellantis’s chief operating officer for the Americas, informed North American employees of the layoffs and the company’s strategy to navigate the current market landscape affected by tariffs. To cut costs, the company has temporarily shut down production at its Windsor assembly plant in Ontario, Canada for two weeks. This plant creates vehicles such as the Chrysler Pacifica and Dodge Charger Daytona. FCA’s Toluca assembly plant in Mexico, meanwhile, is keeping its doors closed until the end of April. This plant builds both the ICE Jeep Compass and electric Jeep Wagoneer S and currently has about 2,400 workers.
A Milton Keynes representative at Stellantis stressed to us that these decisions are not taken lightly. They are needed because of the perverse incentives created by today’s market realities. Union leaders have challenged this narrative. Sean Fain, president of the United Auto Workers (UAW), unloaded on the company for its treatment of the impacted workers.
“Stellantis continues to play games with workers’ lives,” – Sean Fain
Fain went on to underscore the wider impact of these corporate decisions on the labor movement. It’s really just more of the same, and all that’s wrong with our broken trade system. Stellantis is a case in point, as they continue to throw workers under the bus to make up for mismanagement’s mistakes. This kind of practice is atrocious,” he said.
Lana Payne, president of Unifor, echoed those sentiments in lamenting the timing of the layoffs. She reiterated that Unifor had identified from the start that U.S. tariffs would immediately hurt American autoworkers. In this case, the layoffs were announced before the auto tariff even went into effect. In particular, this highlights the urgent need to combat trade policies that harm workers in the automotive industry.
As Stellantis works to adapt to these industry changes, it is engaging with various stakeholders, including government leaders, unions, suppliers, and dealers. The company’s hope is to chart a course through these choppy waters that causes the least amount of upheaval to its planned workforces.
