New York: Volkswagen workers in Tennessee will begin voting on Wednesday in a vote that could expand unionized labor gains in the auto center of Detroit and become the first foreign automaker to join in South America.
Ahead of the three-day vote, hopes were high among supporters of the United Auto Workers (UAW) in Chattanooga, Tennessee, as the revitalized labor organization took its first aim from Detroit’s Big Three winning strike last fall.
“We’re very excited,” said Isaac Meadows, a construction worker, as he headed to the factory to hand in his shift just before 2:00 a.m.
South America has become a death zone for unions in the auto industry, including the Chattanooga plant where 5,500 workers vote twice for union representatives.
But labor experts say that the UAW is poised for a historic victory under President Sean Fein, and the success of the Detroit strike will attract workers back.
“The timing is right,” Meadows told AFP. “Wages do not keep up with inflation. People understand that labor, we have a lot of power.”
Fain, 89, who was elected president in March 2023 amid a union corruption scandal, led the first strike last fall at Ford, General Motors, and Stellar.
After a nearly six-week suspension, the UAW won a 25 percent pay raise amid long-sought gains.
He also received support from Democratic President Joe Biden, who joined the UAW picket line and called Fein to this year’s State of the Union address.
Building on that momentum, the UAW announced a massive organizing drive last November targeting 13 companies with nearly 150,000 employees, including new players like Tesla and Lucid.
Many of the targeted facilities are in South America, where foreign automakers such as Toyota, Honda and BMW have set up shop.
The UAW has petitioned for a vote at the Mercedes-Benz plant in Alabama, but federal officials have yet to schedule a vote.
While the UAW has long targeted the South, it has been consistently rebuffed in previous elections, with critics portraying the union as an ally that risks job losses and plant closings.
Among them was Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, who spoke out against the move and released a joint letter with five other Republican governors condemning the UAW campaign.
The letter, signed by the governors of Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina and Texas, said, “Unification is definitely harmful to our state jobs.”
“In America, we respect our workforce and we don’t have to pay a third party to tell us who can pick up a box or who can turn a switch,” he said.
Despite opposition from Lee and other Tennessee politicians to VW’s campaign, the German automaker itself has a neutral tone — where companies like Amazon and Starbucks are openly fighting with workers in the US.
“We respect our employees’ right to unionize,” Volkswagen said on its website.
The statement reflects input from the Volkswagen Works Council in Germany which demanded the company immediately cancel the previous union language, a spokesman for the workers’ group said.
The works council also released a video of president Daniela Cavallo and her Wolfsburg colleagues expressing sympathy from Germany and promising to keep “fingers crossed” for victory.
According to Stephen Silvia, author of the UAW’s Southern Games, the UAW has adjusted its lobbying tactics now and is putting more emphasis on local action rather than using a top-down approach.
In an interview, Sylvia called Chattanooga “the best opportunity the UAW has ever seen to plant in the South.” “The UAW victory will give the UAW momentum for the rest of the campaign,” he said.
Tennessee VW workers hold key unionization vote
