The car group Stellantis is halting production at a number of factories in both Canada and Mexico. This means that 4,500 people will be temporarily laid off.
Stellantis has announced that around 7,000 employees will be temporarily laid off, unless they are otherwise affected by cutbacks at the group's factories in Canada and Mexico as a result of new US import tariff rules.
An additional 900 U.S. employees will also be furloughed. At the Windsor plant in Ontario, Canada, approximately 4,500 employees will be furloughed for two weeks.
In Toluca, Mexico, the more than 2,500 employees will be back at work for the rest of April. But they won't be building cars. Production at the two factories will be paused starting Monday.
This is reported by CNBC .
The decision comes just one day after the US government announced its final plans for a 25 percent import tariff on cars, and the pause goes into effect the same day as the tariff.
In addition to the directly affected employees in Canada and Mexico, 900 employees at US factories that supply parts to the Windsor and Toluca plants will also be temporarily laid off.
Was warned of 4,500 layoffs even before the tariffs came into effect
Antonio Filosa, head of Stellantis North America, writes in an email to employees why management has made the drastic decision.
– We continue to assess the medium and long-term effects of these tariffs on our operations, but have also decided to take some immediate steps, including temporarily pausing production at some of our Canadian and Mexican assembly plants.
– These actions will affect some employees at several of our U.S. engine and manufacturing facilities that support those operations.
Stellantis builds Chrysler minivans and the new Charger Daytona EV in Windsor.
The plant is the largest single employer in Windsor, Ontario. The Toluca, Mexico, plant assembles the Jeep Compass and the new Wagoneer S EV.
The Unifor union, which represents Canadian auto workers, says that it has already stepped on the cancer before the tariffs, warning that they are harmful.
– Unifor warned that US tariffs would hurt auto workers almost immediately, and in this case, the employees being laid off were announced before the auto tariffs even went into effect.
"Trump is learning the hard way how interconnected the North American manufacturing system is, with auto workers paying the price for that lesson."
It is currently unclear how much damage the new tariff will do to the automotive industry as a whole. But Stellantis is not the first or only one to pull the handbrake.
Polestar has completely removed the Polestar 2 model from its program because it is built in China. And Volvo is busy moving production to the USA.
The Volkswagen Group is literally holding its breath for the new customs regulations. Read more about it here .
