Remarks by Vice President Harris and Governor Tim Walz at a Campaign Event

UAW Local 900
Wayne, Michigan

3:47 P.M. EDT

     GOVERNOR WALZ:  Wow.  (Applause.)  Wow.  Well, thank you, Mr. President.  The American worker has no greater friend than you and your members.  Thank you for what you do every single day.  (Applause.) 

     And to the sisters and brothers here in this spot, as a union member, thank you for the privilege.  This is holy ground for unions, Local 900.  And to be here and know, for any union member understands what this place stands for and what it means.  And so, thank you for having me here.

     And to each and every one of you, thank you for the privilege of walking that picket line with you last year.  Thank you for allowing us to lift up our voices. 

     And in Minnesota, the work that you did — it didn’t just benefit UAW workers, it benefited all workers.  (Applause.)

     So, I couldn’t be prouder to be on this ticket and couldn’t be prouder to stand with UAW.  (Applause.)

     Think about this: 89 wake-ups.  I’ve been saying this.  Eight-nine days — we can do anything for 89 days.  Telling people, “Sleep when you’re dead.”  We got work to do.  Right now — (applause) — right now, 89 days to make Kamala Harris the next president of the United States.  (Laughs.)  (Applause.)  Yay. 

     Look —

     AUDIENCE:  We’ve got your back!  We’ve got your back!  We’ve got your back! 

     GOVERNOR WALZ:  Yeah.  Think — think about — think about this leader that’s very simple.  She stands on the side of the American people and the American worker.  She’s the one who took on the predators, the fraudsters, the transnational gangs.  And she’s the one that stands up against the billionaires and the corporate greed that bring — that bring — this is who it is.  (Applause.)

     And she has a long record of delivering for union — union members and organized labor. 

     All right.  Everybody in this room knows — and I keep saying this.  This is a bit of preaching to the choir, but the choir needs to sing right now.  (Applause.)  The choir needs to sing. 

     We know — we know that unions built the middle class.  The rest of America has to.

     You know who doesn’t believe that?  Donald Trump.  He sees the world entirely differently.  And it really starts with this, when I look at community and neighbors and unions.  And the word that Shawn said, “unity” — this guy doesn’t know the first thing about unity or service.  He’s too busy serving himself.

     Again and again and again you’ve seen it.  He put himself above us.  He weakened our country to strengthen his own hand.  He mocks our laws.  He sows chaos and division.  That says nothing about how he dealt with as president.  We lived through it.  We lived through it. 

     He froze in the face of COVID, and our neighbors died because of it.  And by doing nothing about COVID, he drove this economy into the ground. 

     And I want to be very clear about this, because there’s a lot of lies that happened when they’re here.  Violent crime was up when Donald Trump was president.  Without even counting his crimes, it was still up.  It was still up.  (Laughter and applause.)

     So, this is very simple.  You know it, and it’s going to take a heck of a lot of hard work, but this election is a simple choice: What direction and what’s our country going to look like?  What direction are we going in?

     You know it.  We’ve said it.  Donald Trump is going to take it backwards. 

     AUDIENCE MEMBER:  We’re not going back!

     GOVERNOR WALZ:  He’s going to — we aren’t going back.  We’re not going back.

     AUDIENCE:  We’re not going back!  We’re not going back!  We’re not going back!

     GOVERNOR WALZ:  It isn’t happening.  We’re not going back.

(Addressing Shawn Fain.)  They know.

     AUDIENCE:  We’re not going back!  We’re not going back!  We’re not going back! 

     GOVERNOR WALZ:  Look, and this thing of — of playing dumb while he sits on the planes with these billionaires and says he do- — “I don’t know anything about Project 2025.  I just fly on the planes with them.”

     You know what it’s going to do.  One of the goals of that, plain and simple — and they know this; this has been going on forever — get rid of labor unions and get rid of the voices that we bring.  They can do whatever the hell they want then.

     If Trump’s — returns, he’s going to learn something from the last time.  He didn’t get the job done.  This time, it will be far, far worse, and he will get the job done and make sure that we can’t organize collectively to improve our lives.  That’s what is coming.

     So, whether he cuts the middle class, makes it more difficult to own a home, whether he repeals the Affordable Care Act so you can’t get health insurance are the things that you know they talk about — gutting Social Security and Medicare. 

     You know what?  When you got a billion dollars, you don’t give a damn about your Social Security check.  But if you’re like my mom and you depend on the Social Security check as your sole income, it’s pretty damn important.  (Applause.)  

     And I’ve been saying it and you’ve been hearing me say it: They will ban abortion across this country no matter what Congress says.

     AUDIENCE MEMBER:  My body, my choice!

     GOVERNOR WALZ:  Now look — damn right, it is.  And I don’t know why this is so simple — or so difficult for these people to understand. 

     You know how things work really well in life and really well with your neighbors and really well in communities?  When you mind your own damn business, things work better.  (Applause.)  Stay out of our business.  Stay out of our business.    

     He’s not fighting for you.  He doesn’t know you.  He doesn’t care about your family.  And his running mate is just as dangerous and backward as he is. 

     So, look, we know who they are.  The choir is ready to sing.  This campaign is about the future — your future.  Vice President Harris sure knows that.  She grew up in a middle-class family.  She goes to work every day making sure families are on the front so that they can get ahead and they can get into the middle class. 

     She believes in something so simple and so beautiful.  And when we go to these rallies, I say it too.  People drive, they sit in the sun, they get there, they stand next to their neighbor for one simple reason.  And just like the vice president says, they believe in their hearts in the promise of America.  They believe it.  They believe it.  (Applause.)

     So, sisters and brothers in the UAW, how great is this going to be?  Please join me in welcoming the next president of the United States, Kamala Harris.  (Applause.)

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Good afternoon, UAW.  (Applause.)  Good afternoon.  Good afternoon.

     Oh, it is good to be in the house of labor.  It is good to be in the house of labor.  (Applause.)

     Thank you, all.  Please have a seat.  Please have a seat.

     Okay.  So, let me just say, first of all, can we hear it again for Tim Walz?  (Applause.)  Isn’t he spectacular?

     You know, I have to tell — people have been asking, “Well — well, what do you and Tim Walz have in common?”  And I said, “Well, you know, a whole lot.  A whole lot.”  You know, we grew up the same way.  We grew up in a community of people, you know — I mean, he grew up in — in Nebraska; me, Oakland, California — (laughs) — seemingly worlds apart. 

     But the same people raised us: good people; hard-working people; people who had pride in their hard work; you know, people who had pride in knowing that we were a community of people who looked out for each other — you know, raised by a community of folks who understood that the true measure of the strength of a leader is not based on who you beat down.  It’s based on who you lift up.  (Applause.)

     GOVERNOR WALZ:  Amen.  Amen.  

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  And, you know, there’s some perversion that’s happened in our country in the last several years where there’s a suggestion that somehow strength is about making people feel small, making people feel alone.  But isn’t that the very opposite of what we know — unions know to be strength? 

     It’s about the collective.  It’s about understanding no one should ever be made to fight alone, that we are all in this together.  (Applause.)

     You know, you know why I fought my entire career for unions and labor?  Because I understand the concept — and the noble concept — behind collective bargaining.  And here it is.  Here it is: fairness.  Fairness.  It’s about saying, “Hey, in a negotiation, don’t we all believe the outcome should be fair?”  I mean, who could disagree with that?  The outcome should be fair.  It should be fair, right?  (Applause.)

     But when you’re talking about the individual and a big company, and you’re requiring that one individual to nego- — negotiate against a big company —

     GOVERNOR WALZ:  Yeah.

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  — how’s that outcome going to be fair? 

     So, collective bargaining is about saying: Let the collective come together around a common experience, which, at its core, is about dignity and the dignity of labor.  (Applause.)

     GOVERNOR WALZ:  That’s right. 

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  And then let the people come together to negotiate so you make the balance, and then the outcome will be fair. 

     And isn’t that what we’re talking about in this here election?  We’re saying we just want fairness.  We want dignity for all people.  We want to recognize the right all people have to freedom and liberty, to make choices — especially those that are about heart and home — and not have their government telling them what to do.  (Applause.)

     Our campaign is about saying we trust the people, we see the people, we know the people.  You know one of the things I love about our country?  We are a nation of people who believe in those ideals that were foundational to what made us so special as a nation.  We believe in those ideals. 

     And the sisters and brothers of labor have always fought for those ideals — always fought for those ideals.  And we know we are a work in progress.  We haven’t yet quite reached all of those ideals, but we will die trying because we love our country and we believe in who we are.  (Applause.)

     And that’s what our campaign is about.  We love our country.  We believe in our country.  We believe in each other.  We believe in the collective.  We’re not falling for these folks who are trying to divide us, trying to separate us, trying to pull us apart.  That’s not where the strength lies.

     AUDIENCE MEMBER:  (Inaudible.)

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  And there is that.  (Laughter.) 

     And so, I say to all the members of UAW — and Shawn Fain is the first who I talked to about this — I am so deeply honored, as a lifelong supporter of union labor, for Tim and I to have the endorsement of UAW.  (Applause.)  So deeply honored because you walk your walk — you walk your walk. 

     And what we know — like we have talked about, we got 89 days to get this done.  You know, the one thing about all of us is we like hard work.  Hard work is good work.  Hard work is good work. 

     The thing that we like about hard work is we have fun doing hard work because we know what we stand for.  And that’s a big part of this campaign.  You know, when you know what you stand for, you know what to fight for.  (Applause.)  We know what we stand for.  And we stand for the people.  And we stand for the dignity of work.  And we stand for freedom.  We stand for justice.  We stand for equality.  (Applause.)

     GOVERNOR WALZ:  That’s right.  That’s right.

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  And so, we will fight for all of it. 

And the bottom line about UAW is that I also know — and I’ll say to all the friends watching: Look, even if you’re not a member of a union, you better thank unions — (applause) — for that five-day workweek.  You better thank unions for that eight-hour workday.  You better thank unions for that vacation time.  (Applause.)

     So, I’m here to say thank you.  Thank you, thank you, thank you to the sisters and brothers of UAW for all you are and all we will do over these next 89 days.  (Applause.)

     God bless you.  God bless you.  God bless you.  We’re going to get this done.  (Applause.)                                  END                 4:01 P.M. EDT