Detroit, MI – The Obama administration asked Rick Wagoner, the chairman and CEO of General Motors, to step down and he agreed, a White House official said.
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The White House confirmed Wagoner was leaving at the government’s behest after The Associated Press reported his immediate departure, without giving a reason.
On Monday, President Obama is to unveil his plans for the auto industry, including a response to a request for additional funds by GM and Chrysler.
Industry sources had said the White House planned very tough medicine, which turned out to be an understatement. And it went to the very top. The measures to be imposed by the government will have a dramatic effect on workers, unions, suppliers, retirees and the communities where plants are located, the sources said.
GM and Chrysler have to prove their viability as a condition of a federal bailout released under former President George W. Bush, and both have asked the current administration for more money.
Obama said Friday in an interview with CBS’s “Face the Nation,” broadcast Sunday, that the carmakers were going to have to do more.
“There’s been some serious efforts to deal with a combination of long-standing problems in the auto industry,” the president told host Bob Schieffer. “What we’re trying to let them know is that we want to have a successful auto industry, U.S. auto industry. We think we can have a successful U.S. auto industry. But it’s got to be one that’s realistically designed to weather this storm and to emerge at the other end much more lean, mean and competitive than it currently is.
“And that’s gonna mean a set of sacrifices from all parties involved — management, labor, shareholders, creditors, suppliers, dealers. Everybody’s gonna have to come to the table and say it’s important for us to take serious restructuring steps now in order to preserve a brighter future down the road.
Schieffer followed up: “But they’re not there yet.”
Obama added: “They’re not there yet.”
General Motors needs to get rid from the unions
I’m demanding the obama maniac administration to resign now
Since when does a sitting president get involved with private industry? The fact that The Teleprompter is even remotely involved adds to the pathetic state of this administration.
2010 & 2012 can’t come fast enough!
Time will tell what the Messiah can do. Tomorrow we will all be wiser; no point in jumping to conclusions now
Here you go…taking over private industry = a socialist or communist state. Don’t say you weren’t warned!
And if you think obama thought of this, forget it.
It was one of his political strategists telling him that he would look powerful and socialist and he would make the paper showing that he is implementing big “change”.
Big boys play with big cars.
Hey obama , keep the change.
The Zohar is coming true, right in front of our eyes.
Since we will soon own most if not all of GM, why shouldn’t we have someone competent running what is left of the company
…is here!
Big brother and all….
What has happened to America?! I am afraid this administration is the beginning of the end of this great nation…..
i am no obama fan but if the US gov is providing all the financing of GM and it is de-facto nationalized the Gov should be able to decide who runs the company. However I am frightened by the precedent this creates
Rick Wagoner surrendered whatever independence he ever had as CEO the moment he took bailout money from Uncle Sam. The Gubmint owns GM now and the President will call the shots from this point forward. Whether that is a good thing remains to be seen.
Small wonder Ford, with some solvency left, has been hesitant to take bailout money. I suspect that Al Mulally will look to pay back every cent as soon as possible to keep off the chopping block.
Not a bail out – a buy in!
Anonymous Says: Since we will soon own most if not all of GM, why shouldn’t we have someone competent running what is left of the company
Actually, what we are doing is removing someone utterly incompetent. We do not have someone competent there yet but this guy has really let GM waste away for years. Note that FORD ha snot taken any money yet.
Community organizer
Community organizer at work. this is typical what acorn does in the residential real estate industry. they pull off a rent strike bankrupt the owner and then sell the building to the tenants association for pennies. similarly the are bankrupting gm they fire the ceo then have the union take over the entire company.
If Obama can have the CHUTZPAH to ask GM head to step down then certainly we the people have a right to ask Obama to step down for his failed policy of taxing the rich and giving it away as free-money-bailouts to whomever he pleases.
Obama’s policy can’t work because although the poor need money but of the economy doesn’t improve then the rich will have less tax dollars to give to the poor, Obama’s plan is dead before it even gets started.
The government has no business sticking hands into private business. In this case, however, it is not really the government. It is the BANK sticking its nose in as any bank would. Unfortunately, we are the bank. Those using words like socialism clearly don’t know what the word means, because this has nothing to do with socialism…. you could, however, make the argument that it could be communism, but that doesn’t hold up in the purest definition either.
We, the US taxpayers have loaned an enormous amount of money to GM. As major financial stakeholders, do we (through our elected representatives) not get a say in how the company is run? When banks provide risky funding to companies you better believe they get a say, so why don’t we? GM knew exactly what they were getting into when they agreed to accept a taxpayer loan.
GM is in this position because they have refused to ditch their pathetic unions. Unions protect the weak, the stupid and the lazy, and hold back those who outperform. Any worker who is worth employing does not need a union. If you are valued for your work, you should never need a union. If your company doesn’t need/want you anymore, they should have the right to get rid of you. If you are not producing anything that justifies the costs of employing you, they should have the right to get rid of you. Your company should not have to pay you for the rest of your life. Take some responsibility for yourself. SAVE money. Don’t buy things you can’t afford. Stop living beyond your means and you won’t constantly be looking for people to take care of you… whether it be the government, unions, corporations, etc.
Wagoner is a fool who ran this company into the ground. If we ever expect to make anything on our investment we should be glad he is gone. The board of GM was impotent and would not act, so the “President of the US Taxpayer Bank” did. Maybe now they will figure out that you can’t sell a product with single digit margins in a marketplace where your competitors have a 8%-26% cost advantage. Any CEO worth a grain of salt would have fixed that a LONG time ago. GOOD RIDDANCE!
I knew it’s only a matter of time that we will feel the results of the election of this past November. We are turning into a socialist communist state. We should all make sure that we have passports for the entire family, to be ready to flee the country at the right time and not repeat our parents mistake.