As a reporter for the World Socialist Web Site, White has written extensively on the US auto industry, and has interviewed autoworkers in Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, and Illinois. White authored a book, published in 1990, entitled Death on the Picket Line: The Story of John McCoy. The book, an investigative report, treats the killing of a militant coal miner, McCoy, as well as the history of the United Mine Workers in West Virginia. White has been active in Detroit's Committee Against Utility Shutoffs and organized hearings on fires in low income neighborhoods. He has criticized the Obama Administration for what he has described as its policies favoring Wall Street at the expense of workers. White is the Editor of the World Socialist Web Site Autoworkers Newsletter. White announced the creation of the WSWS Autoworker Newsletter in July 2015, as a means to oppose to "UAW Nationalism", pension cuts, poverty wages, and unemployment, and to call for the abolishment of the two-tier wage system, and develop an international unity among autoworkers. The Autoworkers Newsletter played a substantial role in the "No vote" carried out by Fiat Chrysler workers and Nexteer workers in 2015 against the proposed contract.
Election campaigns
White ran as the first presidential candidate for the newly formed Socialist Equality Party in 1996. White ran for Michigan's 112th Congressional seat in 2006, and for president in 2008 with vice-presidential candidate Bill Van Auken. The write-in campaign was accompanied by a redesign of the Socialist Equality Party's website, which would rehost articles written by both candidates for the World Socialist Web Site. White had run for president as a candidate for the Socialist Equality Party with running-mate Fred Mazelis earlier in 1996. In 2012, the Socialist Equality Party ran White and Phyllis Scherrer for U.S. President and Vice President. The campaign was announced from the Cooper Tire factories in Findley, Ohio, where workers were locked out for contesting contract negotiations. White's 2012 presidential campaign kept five core components: international unity in the working class, social equality, opposition to imperialistmilitarism and the assault on democratic rights, opposition to the political subordination of the working class to the Democrats and Republicans, and the rejection of the claims for austerity. White's campaign indicted the crisis that arose from the 2008 global financial crash as evidence of the failure of capitalism to organize society in a productive manner, and called for the building of an independent socialist movement. White called for the defense of social rights to housing, retirement, food, and education. The White-Scherrer ticket was on the ballot in Wisconsin, Louisiana, and had write-in status for Michigan. White visited Canada, Germany, England and Sri Lanka to campaign for socialism and an international working class movement. White was nominated by the Socialist Equality Party to run again as the party's presidential candidate in 2016, with Niles Niemuth as his running mate.
