General Manager Fires 1,314 Employees and Temporary Suspension of Chevy Bolt Production

1,314 employees at two General Motors facilities in Michigan will be let go, including one that makes the Chevy Bolt electric vehicle, which the business has, for the time being at least, stopped.

In addition to the severe setbacks suffered by US autoworkers over the past week, Stellantis has announced that it will be laying off thousands of employees from its Jeep operations in Detroit and Toledo, Ohio.

Due to the company’s decision to stop producing the Bolt EV and EUV on December 18, General Motors (GM) has announced plans to eliminate 945 positions at its Lake Orion assembly plant. Following a $4 billion investment, the factory was supposed to construct the Chevrolet Silverado EV and GMC Sierra EV on GM’s new Ultium EV platform. However, the corporation has delayed the debut from 2024 to late 2025. A GM spokesperson, Kevin Kelly, told The Detroit Press that in order to make that happen, “construction includes significant facility and capacity expansion at the site, including new body and paint shops and new general assembly and battery pack assembly areas.”

According to GM, the next-generation Chevy Bolt EV will make a comeback on the Ultium platform in 2025. This brings back the popular Bolt EV, at least the larger Bolt EUV. The carmaker is replacing its BEV2 platform with the Ultium battery architecture for its next generation of electric vehicles, which will include the Chezy Silverado EV, Hummer EV, and Cadillac Lyriq, among others.

Meanwhile, this week marks the termination of 369 more employees at GM’s Lansing Grand River Assembly factory, which produced the Chevy Camaro Coupe. Yesterday, December 14, marked the last day of production for the muscle car, as the last cars were taken off the assembly line.

Kelly says that on January 2, layoffs will begin. United Auto Workers (UAW) employees there will reportedly be “offered other opportunities in Michigan,” such as employment at Detroit-Hamtramck’s Factory ZERO, according to CNN.

All of this is taking place in the wake of one of the longest auto worker strikes in 25 years, which ended with GM finalising its new contract with the UAW.

Among other things, the new UAW contract includes employees of GM Subsystem LLC, a subsidiary of GM, therefore GM said it had to reorganise. The Detroit News claims that these employees were paid less for performing the same tasks as regular GM factory workers and had their own contract in place before signing. Their prior pay of $18.50 to $22 per hour have now been increased to full production wages, which peak at $35.88 per hour, as part of the UAW contract.