Musk’s X revokes paid blue check from United Auto Workers after strike called

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Last night when the clock struck midnight, nearly 13,000 workers at Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis went on strike after the so-called “Big Three” car companies failed to reach an agreement with United Auto Workers (UAW). By Friday morning, UAW discovered that X, the platform formerly known as Twitter—in what appeared to be a petty move by platform owner and Tesla CEO Elon Musk—had stripped their account’s verified status, The Intercept reported.

The move seemingly makes it harder for UAW to maximize reach for its posts on X, just as workers have begun striking, demanding better wages and other benefits.

Ford has claimed that the deal UAW was negotiating would have doubled automaker labor costs, and the Intercept noted that often wage increases won by union workers “trickle down” to non-unionized workers like Tesla’s. That perhaps worried Musk, who seemingly has a financial interest in keeping autoworker wages low and a history of union-busting. Earlier this year, Musk lost a court battle and had to delete a tweet that threatened Tesla workers attempting to unionize.