Audi boss
under fire in Germany for Trump rally appearance
Gernot
Döllner criticised for in-person announcement of major investment in US days
before midterm elections
Deborah Cole in Berlin
Mon 26
Oct 2026 14.42 GMT
The head
of the luxury carmaker Audi is under fire in Germany for appearing at a rally
with Donald Trump
just days before the US midterm elections, to announce billions of dollars of
investment in battleground state Georgia.
Gernot
Döllner joined Trump on stage after the US president gave a speech criticised
by the head of an elected body of employees at Audi’s parent company,
Volkswagen, as being full of “racism, sexism, transphobia [and] contempt for
democracy”.
Daniela
Cavallo, the head of the VW works council, added that anyone who heard Trump’s
speech and then saw that Döllner had become an active participant in the event
must “sink into the ground with shame”, according to internal company
communications released to German media.
She said
the investment deal and Döllner’s appearance showed VW’s management had allowed
itself to be “turned into a puppet in the propaganda show of a highly dubious
political figure”.
Isabel
Cademartori, the transport spokesperson for Germany’s Social Democrats – part
of the country’s ruling coalition – called Döllner’s actions a “disgrace”. She
added this was particularly so “in view of the history of the Volkswagen
Group”, in an apparent reference to VW’s
founding as a showcase company under the Nazis.
A
spokesperson for the German government declined to comment on the matter,
calling it “a business decision regarding where the company invests and, in
this case, where the company’s chief executive appears”.
Döllner
announced plans to spend $4bn and create 4,500 jobs in the battleground state
of Georgia. Photograph: Mark Schiefelbein/AP
Döllner
and Trump announced to the crowd on Saturday that Audi
would spend $4bn to build its first factory in the US and create 4,500
jobs, even as VW
aims to slash tens of thousands of positions and close plants in Germany.
“We are
planning to bring our biggest and most premium SUVs, and
produce them here in Macon, Georgia,”
Döllner said at the rally in Perry near Macon, in a highly unusual move for a
European executive during a hard-fought US electoral campaign.
He called
the plans, which foresee factory construction starting next year and car
production beginning in the 2030s, “a long-term investment because we believe
in the American market”.
Audi is
the only premium car manufacturer without its own factory in the US, making it
particularly vulnerable to Trump’s punishing 15% import tariffs, which cost it
an estimated €1.2bn last year. The Macon plant would build 200,000 SUVs
annually.
The head
of the powerful German trade union IG Metall, Christiane Benner, called
Döllner’s US appearance “extremely embarrassing, politically unacceptable and
unworthy of the company, but above all of Audi’s employees”.
She
accused Döllner of being in “flagrant breach” of the company’s code of conduct,
“which expressly requires political neutrality in the run-up to elections”.
She
warned that any major investment like the Macon plant would have to go before
VW’s supervisory board. Benner is the board’s deputy chair.
Volkswagen
is locked in a battle between management and labour over a push to cut as many
as 100,000 jobs and close factories. It has blamed the downsizing on intense
competition from Chinese carmakers, as well as US tariffs and the expensive
transition to electric vehicles.
Its
German factories are under particular pressure to drive down costs, with
Audi’s facility in Neckarsulm, which employs 15,000 people, among four VW
plants threatened with closure from early next decade.
“Each
site must do its part in terms of competitiveness and the long-term strength of
Audi,” a company spokesperson said.
Trump is deeply
unpopular in Germany and has riled its political mainstream by vocally
backing the far-right Alternative für Deutschland. The AfD is the country’s
most popular party, according to polls, and has actively
courted Trump’s support.
The 3
November election in Georgia could be decisive in the
Democrats’ battle to regain a majority in the Senate. The incumbent
senator, Jon Ossoff, is fighting a tough re-election battle against Republican
challenger Mike Collins, in a state Trump won in 2024.
Trump has
argued ahead of the midterms that his tariffs on car imports are helping
the US economy.
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário