Sen. Sherrod Brown slammed President Donald Trump Wednesday during a speech on the Senate floor in response to Falcon Transport’s announcement that it would be closing its door.
The company, which serviced Lordstown’s General Motors plant, told its workers in an email Saturday that it was “not able to continue operations” and would be “shutting down effective today.”
“Please stop any work you are doing for the company immediately. You are not expected to return to work. Please be on the lookout for further information we will be sending regarding this information, Jayson Calhoun, the company’s operations director, wrote in an email, according to The Business Journal.
Brown said Wednesday that he and his colleagues warned Trump that “if he let” General Motors close its Lordstown plant, the “layoffs wouldn’t stop with GM,” but would “work their way up and down the entire supply chain.”
The President promised that auto jobs would return to the Valley, but refused to take meaningful action when the Lordstown GM plant closed. Falcon Transport was part of the supply chain for that plant – and this weekend, they closed their doors, leaving 500+ Ohioans out of a job. pic.twitter.com/aOooVhMUHs
— Sherrod Brown (@SenSherrodBrown) May 1, 2019
“The president did nothing other than rub salt in workers’ wounds by boasting about imaginary new factories coming to Ohio,” Brown said. “Now this weekend we found out that the additional layoffs we feared are starting to happen.”
Brown also had some harsh words for Falcon Transport over the way it announced the closure.
“Some drivers were left all around the country when they found out. Workers in my state and everywhere deserve better than an email letting them know their livelihood’s been taken away,” he said, and went on to claim that they “deserve better than a president who breaks his promises.”
“People trusted him. A lot of people had voted for him. They put their faith in him. They believed what he said. And what did Trump do? Instead of working to save their jobs he turned around and he handed corporations a 50 percent off coupon to send their jobs oversees,” Brown claimed.
Brown later suggested that the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act was part of Trump’s “phony populism.”
“You don’t give tax cuts to the rich people and then stick it to the middle class,” Brown continued. “I’m calling on the president. Maybe you should try keeping your promises. Maybe you should actually fight for auto workers. Maybe you should actually stand up and support workers up and down the auto supply chain for a change.”
Brown is encouraging the president to support his American Cars, American Jobs Act, which would give customers a discount for buying American-made cars and revoke tax cuts for “auto manufacturers that ship jobs overseas.”
550 employees were laid off as a result of Falcon Transport’s closure. Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH-13), now a Democratic candidate for president, said during a House floor speech Wednesday that “nobody gives a damn about the workers. ”
“The workers of the United States of America are tired of being pawns in this big corporatists’ game,” he said. “If we could bail out the corporations that have done everything wrong, we can start helping the workers who have done everything right.”
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Anthony Gockowski is managing editor of Battleground State News, The Ohio Star, and The Minnesota Sun. Follow Anthony on Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Lordstown Complex” by Lordstown Assembly.
