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President Joe Biden on Tuesday is taking the unprecedented step of standing with striking members of the United Auto Workers union, with his visit to Michigan coming a day before the 2024 Republican presidential primary’s front-runner, Donald Trump, plans his own visit to the picketers.
The Democratic president’s show of solidarity with the UAW also comes as pollster Morning Consult says the GOP has “closed its deficit against the Democratic Party on the question of caring about ‘people like me.’”
Some 39% of respondents applied that descriptor to Republicans, according to a Morning Consult survey that was released Tuesday. That’s up from 30% in 2016 and in line with the 41% who applied it this year to Democrats, given the poll’s margin of error of 2 percentage points.
As shown in the chart above, Morning Consult’s survey found that Democrats have maintained their advantage over Republicans in other indicators, such as caring about poor Americans, and that the GOP is still viewed as more supportive of big business.
When asked on Monday if Trump’s plan to visit the UAW members played into the Biden White House’s decision to go to Michigan, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters: “Absolutely not.” She said Biden wants to “stand with autoworkers” but stressed that the administration is “not involved in negotiations” between the union and Detroit’s Big Three automakers — General Motors
GM,
Ford
F,
and Chrysler parent Stellantis
STLA,
One analyst said Biden’s decision to join the UAW’s picket line is a sign of weakness and suggested his move could weigh on U.S. stocks
SPX.
“When you’re having to shore up your base this overtly, you’re confessing political weakness, and also making it that much more difficult to appeal to the crossover independent voter that’s crucial for victory,” said Terry Haines, founder of Pangaea Policy, in a note Monday.
“This may be necessary Democratic politics, but it makes the auto strike more prolonged — which is markets negative,” he added.
The main U.S. stock gauges
DJIA
COMP
lost ground Tuesday, as the market continued to price in hawkish interest-rate projections from the Federal Reserve.
Now read: How the stock market’s performance under Biden is worse than under Obama or Trump — in one chart
