Domestic tasks, spring cleaning and rest, this is how some local automatic workers who are out of work this week spend their time.
But at the bottom of his minds, anxiety for his uncertain future hangs heavy.
“This giant from one side to another, and this does not know what will come later, has been really frustrating, annoying, disconcerting, like the entire range of emotions,” said Derek Gungle, who has worked in Stellantis for more than 10 years.
The automotive rates of 25 percent of the president of the United States, Donald Trump, sent immediate shock waves through the industry last week, and the Windsor assembly plant of almost 100 years was among the first facilities.
Stellantis has temporarily closed the plant, as well as others in the United States in Mexico, while the company evaluates tariff damage. In Windsor, more than 3,000 workers in the factory, which brings together the Minivan of Pacifica and Dodge Charger Daytona, are fired until April 21.
The company said Thursday that there were no changes in the plan to resume operations that day.
But some workers say that there will be more difficult times ahead. Trump has argued that tariffs will bring manufacturing jobs to experts in the United States industry, have warned, however, that tariffs on the deeply interconnected automotive sector from North America could damage it out of repair.
“Working in cars, we are accustomed to layoffs from time to time, especially to reorganize and other things,” said Gungle. “But this is a very different moment.”
Commercial measures and rhetoric in constant change of Trump have caused chaos in world financial markets. Unpredictability, and what it means to the Automotive Capital of Canada in the long term, has been one of the most difficult things to handle Gungle and other motor cars, since Trump has intensified its commercial war in recent months.
“Sometimes it could be, you know, at eight in the morning, there is an announcement at noon, there is another announcement of four and there is a complete change in politics,” Gungle said.
“It has been an emotional roller coaster during the last four months,” he said.
Derek Gungle has worked at the Stellantis Windsor assembly plant for more than 10 years, but Friday was his last turn for at least two weeks. The car plant is stopping production, since it sails for new US tariffs in imported vehicles.
Trump’s last pivot arrived on Wednesday, when he caused confusion for Announcing some Representation of rates for several countries, but not in Canada.
Denis Desulniers, who has worked at the Windsor plant for 31 years, is no stranger to uncertainty.
“It’s the life of an automatic worker,” he said. “It is up and down in your entire career.”
Among those bass were the financial crisis of 2008, when General Motors left the city, and Ford and Chrysler cut the local jobs. Then, the Covid-19 pandemic hit, closing plants and interrupting supply chains.
But Desoulniers said he also believes that the current situation feels unusual.
“This time, it’s a bit different because it’s like your best friend, your best friend you have been working with forever,” he said. “And suddenly, ‘Well, we don’t like that idea, so we will charge the rates so that their trucks are to cost more money to buy'”.
“I don’t know how long it will last,” Disiniers added, who works as a shares leader, bringing pieces to the assembly line. “I don’t know if Mr. Trump is only throwing it and waiting for negotiations to occur, but I hope the negotiations occur sooner rather than later.”
DESULNIERS said that both his father and his grandfather worked at the factory. Now, your child is also employed there.
Blaise Desulniers has worked at the full -time plant for seven months. Work in Trim, installing side airbags.
“I’ve always seen it as a good job,” he said. “So seeing the opportunity to come to full -time work, I left school and took it because I knew it would be something that could raise my future family.”
Blaise said he was studying at St. Clair College before making the change, and says he could still return to school. “But I know there are many people who do not have the opportunity to do so.
“So just looking at those people who do not have that opportunity, just imagining me in that place, it is very scary at this time.”
The three men are now collecting unemployment, with the two most senior freelancers who receive Stellantis recharges to bring their payment to their typical salaries. However, Blaise still does not qualify for those surcharges.
“It’s very useful,” Gungle said on recharge. “But at the end of the day, it is not yet a full week of payment.”
He said he believes that Windsor-Essex has already begun to feel the economic blow.
“These rates have advanced over us during the last months,” he said. “So both my wife, myself and a lot of other people with whom I have spoken in the plant have been hardening our belts for a while.”
DESULNIERS said he is “spending less, simple and simple.”
“Not only will it affect the automatic worker,” he said. “It will affect all Mom and Pop stores in Windsor and Essex County at the same time.”
DESULNIERS said he hopes the industry, and the city to survive.
“We had 2008, we had bankruptcy, we had Covid,” he said. “We always return stronger.”
He said he wants Trump, who signed the existing United States-Mexico and Canada agreement in his first term, negotiate any concerns he now has with Canada instead of using tariffs.
“Once I negotiate it, it will be better for workers in the United States. It will be better for workers in Canada,” he said.
“Let’s build cars.”
However, Gungle says he distrusts himself from trusting the United States and wants the Canadian automotive sector to look for more and more markets.
“We are dealing with the same administration in the United States that negotiated the new NAFTA five years ago,” he said. “And in fact, it is the signature of the same person in which five years ago, and now they will return to their word. So how would we trust something that is negotiated from this point?”
For Gungle, the commercial war could mark a permanent change in the relations of Canada-United States.
“I don’t know if our relationship with the United States is once again as it was,” he said. “Why would I want to support an economy that doesn’t support us?”
