Nearly 1,400 workers were laid off Wednesday from what had been the Navistar truck factory in southwestern Ohio, the Associated Press reported — a blow large enough to basically erase an entire year of job growth in the greater Dayton area. The layoffs landed just three days before President Donald Trump’s rally Saturday at nearby Butler High School in Vandalia.
Kyle Bos, 30, was among those let go. A United Auto Workers member with two daughters and a third child due in January, Bos told the AP that five grocery items now cost what a full cart once did. Asked how many times he voted for Trump, he held up three tattooed fingers — but said he is done with the president and plans to spend the final weeks before the November election canvassing for Democrats.
“Something has to change politically in this country,” said Bos, who describes himself as a centrist. International Motors, Navistar’s parent company, offloaded the plant amid weak demand; trade analysts noted that broad tariffs failed to improve demand for the facility’s trucks.
The layoffs underscore the economic anxiety hanging over Ohio’s stretch run to the Nov. 3 election, where voters will pick a new governor and decide a nationally watched U.S. Senate race. For the Dayton region, the sudden loss of nearly 1,400 manufacturing jobs resets a year of hard-won employment gains.
