President Joe Biden touts pension assistance plan during Cleveland visit Wednesday afternoon

President Joe Biden highlighted his administration’s efforts to secure funds for troubled pension plans during a visit Wednesday to Max S. Hayes High School in Cleveland.

Biden focused his remarks on the American Rescue Plan's Special Financial Assistance program, which will ensure that all multiemployer pension plans pay full benefits through at least 2051. An estimated 100,000 Ohioans participate in the affected pension systems.

Previously, those funds, which are created by agreements between employers and a union, were expected to become insolvent in 2026.

“A lot of politicians like to talk about how they’re going to do something about it. Well, I’m here today to say we’ve done something about it,” Biden said, prompting chants of his first name.

The program will also ensure that all plans that were previously forced to cut benefits will be able to restore those cuts in full, maintain full benefits into the foreseeable future and be projected to remain indefinitely solvent, he said.

Among variations of his oft-repeated catchphrase — “When the middle class does well, everybody does well” —  Biden emphasized the importance of unions.

“There’s a middle class for one reason: American unions,” he said to cheers from the crowd full of union members.

Before starting his planned remarks on pension plans and the economy, Biden acknowledged the Akron police shooting of Jayland Walker. Walker, 25, died after being shot over 60 times June 27 by Akron police officers following a car chase.

Biden said the Justice Department, the civil rights division of Akron’s FBI field office and the U.S. attorney’s office in Akron were all closely monitoring the situation.

“If the evidence reveals potential violations of federal criminal statutes, the Justice Department will take the appropriate action and I just want you to know what's going to happen,” Biden said.

The Akron and national NAACP and others are calling for the Justice Department to investigate the Akron police shooting.

More: President Biden: Justice Department is monitoring Akron police shooting of Jayland Walker

President Joe Biden criticizes Republicans for not supporting bill

Both Biden and Democratic U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown criticized Republicans in Congress for not supporting the pension assistance bill, which was named for Butch Lewis, a retired Teamster from southwest Ohio who worked alongside others on the pension restoration efforts.

"Not one single, solitary Republican voted for the Butch Lewis Act," Biden said as the crowd booed. “In fact, when this bill was moving through Congress, Republicans called these pensions, quote: ‘rat holes.’ No, that was their phrase on the floor: rat holes. Who do they think they are? Who do they think you are, for God's sake?”

More: Retired Akron-area Teamsters see hope but wait for full funding of troubled pension plan

Republicans criticize Joe Biden's energy policies

Ahead of Biden's remarks, Ohio Republicans criticized the president's energy polices and accused him of not taking enough steps to stem the tide of inflation. Energy analysts told USA TODAY the cost of oil is driving up gas prices across the globe, leaving Biden with few options to bring them down at home.

More: Is Biden to blame for higher gas prices? Drivers pay more in 93 countries.

Republicans, for their part, contend more oil production in the United States would solve the problem.

“I think it’s absurd that Joe Biden is coming to Cleveland with anything other than an apology," U.S. Senate candidate J.D. Vance said.

Throughout the event, speakers, including Labor Secretary Marty Walsh and U.S. Rep. Marcy Kaptur, emphasized Biden’s commitment to American workers and unions.

“The president that we have right now,” Walsh said, “is the most pro-worker president we’ve had in history.”

This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: President Joe Biden discusses funding pension plans in Cleveland on Wednesday