General Motors, Michigan | featured news

"If he [Obama] didn't come through and give that vote and say, 'Yes we have got to save Chrysler. We have to save GM. We've got to do this,' all this Sterling Heights would have been gone, would have been dead."

In seeking support in Michigan, Obama speaks frequently about how the federal bailout of General Motors Co. and Chrysler Group led to GM's resurgence as the world's No. 1 automaker and 32,000 more auto-related jobs in the state since the companies emerged from their 2009 managed bankruptcies. Romney opposed the move, even writing a New York Times opinion piece in 2008 that carried the headline "Let Detroit Go Bankrupt."

General Motors Co. will go to 24-hour operations at factories in Kansas, Michigan and Indiana to handle an expected increase in demand and to make up for production lost from a large-scale factory consolidation announced earlier in the year.

The automaker says it will add a third shift at its Fairfax plant in Kansas City, Kan., in January.