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    • Kamala Harris vows to protect workers’ rights in Detroit
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    Kamala Harris vows to protect workers’ rights in Detroit

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    In a city with a rich working-class history, Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris vowed to protect workers’ rights if elected, while casting her Republican opponent, former President Donald Trump, as an enemy of workers during a Labor Day speech Monday at Northwestern High School in Detroit.

    “Always good to be in the labor house,” Harris said at the start of her brief speech in the high school gym. As she took the stage, Harris hugged a group of union presidents who greeted her under a blue banner that read, “Union Strong for Harris-Walz.”

    “Don’t we love Labor Day?” Harris asked the sea of ​​workers wearing their union T-shirts and applauding her. She was repeating a familiar Democratic campaign refrain that unions helped build the middle class in America.

    According to Harris, all workers, even those who are not union members, have benefited from strong, union-dominated workplaces.

    “Everywhere I go, I tell people, ‘Look, you may not be a union member. You should thank a union member,’” Harris said, drawing cheers. “For the five-day week, you should thank a union member. For sick leave, you should thank a union. For paid time off. You should thank a union for vacation time.”

    Harris criticized Trump for being a fierce opponent of workers’ rights. He blocked overtime pay for millions of workers, opposed efforts to raise the minimum wage, appointed “union busters” to the National Labor Relations Board and supported right-to-work legislation that allows workers covered by collective bargaining agreements to opt out of paying union dues and fees.

    “Trump is a scumbag,” the crowd chanted in response to the litany of attacks on Trump.

    “But here’s the thing, we do have a choice here,” Harris said. If elected, she has pledged to pass the PRO Act to give workers more power to organize.

    Harris follows in the footsteps of numerous presidential candidates who visited the Motor City on Labor Day to campaign. And Harris’ visit marks her first to Michigan — a key battleground — since she formally accepted her party’s nomination in Chicago during the Democratic National Convention.

    The latest Free Press poll shows Trump with a one percentage point lead over Harris in both a head-to-head race and a four-way race with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. — who suspended his campaign and endorsed Trump — and Green Party candidate Jill Stein. The poll, by Lansing-based EPIC-MRA, surveyed 600 active and likely voters in Michigan between the final day of the Democratic National Convention and Monday and had a margin of error of plus or minus four percentage points.

    “We know this is going to be a very exciting race,” said Harris.

    Harris’s abbreviated presidential campaign, which launched after President Joe Biden left office in late July, sought to portray herself as a champion of workers’ rights while painting Trump as an ally of the billionaire class who is unresponsive to the middle class.

    Laborers’ International Union of North America President Brent Booker kicked off the Harris rally. He praised Harris’ advocacy for labor rights, saying she had joined striking workers on the picket line and led a task force on labor organizing. Booker said he had never seen a more pro-union president than Biden and declared that Harris would continue Biden’s legacy.

    Michigan Democrats also took the stage to highlight Harris’ support for unions and criticize Trump as a candidate who wants union members to support his campaign but will turn his back on them once he gets to the White House.

    “Union members deserve better than the failed anti-labor policies of the Republican Party and Donald Trump. Look, when your most famous line is, ‘You’re fired,’ you really don’t understand workers,” said Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a national co-chair of Harris’ campaign. She characterized Trump as an out-of-touch rich man. Whitmer, by contrast, said the middle-class roots of Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, help them understand the economic challenges facing voters.

    A look back: 5 Memorable Visits to Detroit by Presidential Candidates on Labor Day

    If elected, Harris has repeatedly said she would make building the middle class a top goal of her presidency. It’s an economic message Dwan McGrady, 55, of Detroit, who attended the Harris event, said the vice president should remain focused on her efforts to drum up support for her campaign. McGrady, a special-needs kindergarten teacher at the Detroit Public Schools Community District and a Harris supporter who said having a pro-union president is very important to her and said Harris stands in stark contrast to Trump on that front.

    “She’s very pro-union,” McGrady said of Harris.

    Outside the event, a few dozen critics of Harris shouted pro-Palestinian chants, angered by her refusal to call for an embargo on U.S. arms shipments to Israel, and called the vice president “killer Harris,” all while her supporters lined up to see Harris.

    Trump had no campaign rallies planned for Monday, but the Michigan Republican Party did host a press conference with auto workers supporting Trump.

    Team Trump Michigan Communications Director Victoria LaCivita said Harris’ policies would hurt workers, and cited energy initiatives to mitigate climate change, including industrial policies to transition the auto industry to electric vehicles, which LaCivita described as a ban on gasoline-powered cars, while Harris’ campaign has said the vice president does not support an electric vehicle mandate. “President Donald Trump will return us to an all-of-the-above energy plan, protect Michigan auto jobs and support American workers,” LaCivita said.

    After a stop in Detroit, Harris was scheduled to appear in Pittsburgh for a campaign event with Biden, their first joint campaign appearance since he withdrew from the presidential race and endorsed Harris as his replacement. Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, campaigned in Milwaukee earlier on Monday.

    In 2016, Trump won Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — the so-called “blue wall” states because they hadn’t supported a GOP presidential candidate since the 1980s. Biden won all three states in 2020 to defeat Trump, and the trio of swing states could decide the election again this fall.

    Contact Clara Hendrickson at [email protected] or 313-296-5743. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter, @clarajanehen.

    Want to learn more about this year’s Michigan elections? Check out our voter guide, subscribe to our election newsletter, and feel free to share your thoughts in a letter to the editor.

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