WASHINGTON — Six candidates seeking to become president of the United Auto Workers faced off in an online forum Thursday night filled with critiques and attacks against current union leader Shawn Fain. Fain, in an opening statement, touted his accomplishments since winning a 2023 election to head the organization and preempted criticisms of his leadership by the other candidates: "Tonight ...

Striking United Auto Workers carry picket signs outside a Stellantis- affiliated Mopar parts distribution facility in Center Line, Michigan late Sunday afternoon on Sept. 23, 2023.

John T. Greilick/The Detroit News/TNS

WASHINGTON — Six candidates seeking to become president of the United Auto Workers faced off in an online forum Thursday night filled with critiques and attacks against current union leader Shawn Fain.

Fain, in an opening statement, touted his accomplishments since winning a 2023 election to head the organization and preempted criticisms of his leadership by the other candidates: "Tonight you're going to hear from them about monitor reports, about text messages or retaliation or family, or you're going to hear about foul language."

"But I want to talk about you," he said to viewers of the YouTube livestream. "This election is about a simple choice: Whether we keep fighting the companies and delivering for the membership, or whether we go back to the old days of kissing the company's ass and hoping for the best."

The current UAW president was correct to anticipate those criticisms, as the other five candidates often seized on findings from a court-appointed union monitor that Fain has created a "culture of fear" at the union, retaliated against other leaders and attempted to destroy evidence of doing so, and so far failed to develop a long-recommended budget for the organization of roughly 400,000 dues-paying members.

"I have never heard you once in your four years say, 'You know what? I messed up. I'm taking accountability,'" said Greg Mooney, a candidate who works in communications at tank-maker General Dynamics Land Systems in Lima, Ohio.

He added: "Your ego is going to bankrupt this union because we are going to be taken in full receivership if we don't get our act together. Shame on you.

The candidates participating in the forum were:

—Fain, the union's president since 2023

—Mooney, who has focused on the threat of AI on jobs

—Rich Boyer, a current vice president of the union and head of its Stellantis Department

—Brian Keller, a Stellantis NV worker from Michigan who also ran for president four years ago

—Tricia Geiger, UAW international servicing representative from the Toledo area

—Will Lehman, a Mack Trucks Inc. worker from Pennsylvania

The forum ran for more than two hours and came some three weeks before mail-in ballots will become available for the UAW's International Executive Board 2026 elections. Ballots are due back by October 5, according to the union.

The election will be conducted under the guidance of the union's court-appointed monitor, as was the candidate forum. Longtime labor journalist Steve Greenhouse moderated the event.

Clashes over monitor, Fain's conduct

Fain has repeatedly clashed with monitor, attorney Neil Barofsky, and said Thursday that the acrimony began only after the UAW's leadership board called for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war.

Boyer, whom Fain removed from leading the Stellantis Department over a "dereliction of duty," called out his rival for how he's dealt with the monitor.

"I listened to the presidential debate from the last election. I listened to President Fain speak at that time, and Sean said to (former UAW president) Ray Curry that he welcomed the monitor, because the monitor was critical of Ray," Boyer said. "You can't say he's OK but then be critical when he goes against you. That's a problem."

Boyer was ultimately reinstated after a monitor's report in December revealed a retaliatory scheme by Fain's inner circle against Secretary-Treasurer Margaret Mock, who also had her department leadership positions revoked.

Fain at one point in the evening called Boyer a "wet dream" for companies in their negotiations with the UAW, to which Boyer took exception and said was representative of the foul-mouthed leader's poor conduct.

"That's a pretty disrespectful thing for you to say to me," Boyer said. "I would never say that in front of this membership about you. I think that as the president of the International Union, you'd have a little more tact, a little more class, and a little more understanding when you talk to people."

Keller alluded to reports that Fain could be indicted for claims he pressured another high-ranking union official to secure benefits for his fiancée and her sister.

"If he gets elected, then just remember that the International Executive Board is going to pick the next president. So that's something you might want to think about before supporting Shawn Fain," he said.

Fain defends lack of budget

Several of the candidates called out Fain for failing to get a union budget passed under his watch, especially after he opposed a plan recommended by Mock for doing so.

"How's Margaret supposed to get a budget passed when the majority of you are voting against her budget proposal?" Keller said of Fain and the current IEB.

The current UAW president defended his actions on the matter.

"Her solution at that time, and still is, was relying on paying vendors millions of dollars to come in and fix the problem because she wasn't competent enough, and nobody in that department was," he said.

Candidates talk bargaining, retiree benefits

Lehman attacked Fain over the UAW's performance in its 2023 strikes against the Detroit Three automakers (Stellantis, Ford Motor Co. and General Motors Co.). Most labor and business analysts have said the union achieved significant victories in that fight, but the Mack Trucks worker saw the efforts differently.

"It was not a real strike. It was a disaster. It was a Hollywood strike. First, workers were kept on the job working overtime. When workers voted overwhelmingly to strike, at most 30% of workers were called out. That's not solidarity. That's isolation," he said.

The UAW deployed an intentional strategy of striking against all three automakers at once — a novel approach by the union — but only at specific plants, with plans to expand the work stoppage if companies failed to meet demands.

"And the workers that were called out were starved out on the picket line on inadequate strike pay. That's how you divide the workers to ram through contracts that overwhelmingly don't meet their needs," Lehman added. "The reality is it was billed in the corporate media as some kind of historic gain, but it divided up workers and kept the vast majority of auto workers on the line."

On the topic of providing additional support for UAW retirees, all the candidates agreed that the union must do more.

"We all know that our members out there with defined pension benefits is being chewed up by inflation. It's impacting the quality of their life. We know that lack of health care after retirement is creating a barrier for people that want to leave the workforce," said Geiger, who is the only woman running in the race.

"We should not be building ourselves up for a no before we even go to the bargaining table," she added. We know that the pension plans are sound."

Mooney, the General Dynamics worker, suggested that the UAW address gaps in retiree health care by creating its own system separate from employers.

"We can take our collective buying power of our current retirees, create a health care plan, and lower the cost," he said, calling his plan UAW Cares. "We can't keep waiting on these companies to, you know, give us handouts. There's things that we can do today that we can enact."

Fain celebrated small gains for retirees under his watch, such as bonuses for retirees during the 2023 strikes, but acknowledged there was more to do in bargaining talks with the Detroit Three scheduled for 2028.

"We've made it a priority from day one to put money in retirees' pockets," Fain said. "We've worked to do that, but we got to do a hell of a lot more. We got to address retirement insecurity in this country, and that is our plan this next round of bargaining."

A full recording of the forum is available on YouTube.