UAW International President Shawn Fain announced that the GM Lansing Delta Township assembly plant and Ford's Chicago assembly plant will be joining the strike Friday. No local plants were impacted by the latest decision.
Fain said the strikes will begin at noon.
Friday's strike expansion includes 7,000 UAW members.
Last week, the union announced that the Stellantis distribution center in Streetsboro was joining strike efforts. Workers at the Jeep plant in Toledo are also striking.
Watch our report from last week:
UAW Local 573 represents 114 members at the Stellantis facility in Streetsboro, according to Unionfacts.com.
The UAW’s contract with the automakers expired at midnight on Sept. 14, and workers walked out of a Ford assembly plant near Detroit, a GM factory in Wentzville, Missouri, and a Jeep plant run by Stellantis in Toledo, Ohio. The initial strike has involved about 13,000 of the union’s 146,000 members.
The union is pointing to the companies’ huge recent profits as it seeks wage increases of 36% over four years. The companies have offered a little over half that amount. The UAW has other demands, including a 32-hour work week for 40 hours of pay and a restoration of traditional pension plans for newer workers.
The companies say they can’t afford to meet the union’s demands because they need to invest profits in a costly transition from gas-powered cars to electric vehicles.
