Trump says UAW talks don't matter because EV shift will kill jobs

Former U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday it mattered little whether striking union autoworkers secured a favorable deal in talks with America's biggest carmakers because the shift to electric vehicles would soon make them obsolete.

Speaking in terms that contrast with the confidence shown by carmarkers spending aggressively to electrify their fleets, Trump predicted the U.S. auto industry would succumb to massive losses in just a few years.

"It doesn’t make a damn bit of difference what you get because in two years you're all going to be out of business," Trump told several hundred blue-collar workers gathered at a non-union auto supplier outside Detroit.

Trump, who chose to skip the second Republican presidential debate on Wednesday night, has made attacking President Joe Biden's promotion of electric vehicle production through incentives a routine component of his stump speech.