The UAW’s 2014 Union-Built Vehicles List features quality, variety and fuel-efficient vehicles along with a number of new additions that represent new jobs for America’s workers. As a result of 2011 bargaining between the UAW and Ford, Fusion sedans are being made at the Flat Rock, Mich., Assembly Plant. The Fusion was previously made only in Mexico. Also, the Ford Transit Connect van, insourced from Europe, is now being produced at the Kansas City Assembly Plant in Claycomo, Mo.

When the American automobile industry was on the verge of collapse in 2009, Mitt Romney said he’d let it go bankrupt. President Obama engineered a recovery program that put this vital industry back on its feet and saved hundreds of thousands of jobs, not just at the auto plants, but up and down the supply chain and throughout American manufacturing. This new video from the United Steelworkers (USW) tells that story through the eyes of the men and women of USW Local 903 at the Gary, Ind., Dana Holding Corp. axle plant. 

Watch USW's new video and share it on Facebook, Twitter and all your social networks. 

The Obama administration today announced that it will take action against unfair trade practices by China in auto part exports to the United States and tariff barriers against the import of American-made cars to China. Meanwhile, over the weekend, the Boston Globe detailed Mitt Romney’s business and personal investments in Chinese manufacturing companies. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka says the administration’s action is:

Good news, not just for workers who rely on the auto industry, but for the entire American economy.

In 2008, at the height of the recession, Mitt Romney declared that government should “let Detroit go bankrupt” rather than providing federal aid to automakers. President Obama was a lot smarter than that. As a result of federal assistance, General Motors (GM) posted record profits and paid back its loans early, Chrysler paid back all its loans and hundreds of thousands of U.S. workers are on the job who otherwise would be out of work (click on chart to enlarge).

Karen Eusanio, a UAW Local 112 member and second generation auto worker, is one of those workers. Speaking last night at the Democratic National Convention, Eusanio recalled her struggle to support her children after GM laid her off, and the unpopularity of Obama’s plan to save the auto industry. Yet, President Obama didn’t think about the polls or the politics, said Eusanio.

He thought about the people. Because he put himself in our shoes, we’re back on our feet. Obama believed in us, he stood up for us.

Last night, Paul Ryan lived up to the Mitt Romney campaign pledge that it would not be “dictated by fact-checkers” when he blamed President Obama for the closure of a General Motors plant in his hometown of Janesville, Wis.  As any fact-checker or Janesville worker who lost a job knows, the plant closed during the Bush administration.

An excerpt from a USA Today column by UAW President Bob King:

The bankruptcy restructuring of General Motors (GM) and Chrysler in 2009 through the creation of new companies formed with assets purchased from those troubled companies was highly successful. Today GM and Chrysler are profitable, investing in America and creating jobs.

U.S. voters across the political spectrum overwhelming have negative views of companies that outsource jobs to China and strongly support Buy America provisions, according to a poll released today by the Alliance for American Manufacturing. Voters also say strengthening manufacturing in the United States is a top economic priority and they back the creation of a national manufacturing strategy to better compete with foreign nations that already have them in place.

New data showing U.S. median net worth plunged by nearly 40 percent following the not-so-Great Recession is getting big media play today. Pundits are shocked—which gated communities do they live in again?—but the Federal Reserve figures showing individuals’ net worth dropped from $126,400 in 2008 to $77,300 in 2010 doesn’t come as a surprise to most Americans. They’ve been struggling to find jobs in an economy where there still are more than three job seekers for ever one available.

Meanwhile, Republicans in Congress are holding hostage the America Dream.

With all the great news out today about how U.S. automakers are pushing factories to the limit because of demand for new vehicles, surely
presidential candidate Mitt Romney is praising the auto industry’s comeback?

Well, maybe not. Here’s what he said in the face of the nation’s helping hand to the auto industry a few years ago:

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s claim that he shares credit for the auto industry’s recovery is “almost laughable,” said AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka on Bloomberg Television’s “Political Capital with Al Hunt,” airing tonight at 9 p.m. EDT and showing again throughout the weekend (check it out here).