Employees at Volkswagen’s Chattanooga, Tennessee, plant will vote on whether to unionize this week in the first test of the United Auto Workers’ new organization drive.
The more than 4,000 workers at the Chattanooga plant will begin voting Wednesday and continue until 8 p.m. Friday. The pro-union push needs a simple majority to succeed.
The countdown to a vote began last month, when the UAW reported that a supermajority of workers at the VW plant had signed union cards. The employees then filed for an election with the National Labor Relations Board, which will oversee this week’s election.
Even though most workers at the VW plant signed cards with the UAW, a union victory is not a foregone conclusion. The labor giant failed to unionize the Chattanooga plant in 2019, when the union lost in an 833-776 vote.
While VW endorses an NLRB-backed vote, the German company contends it offers some of the best working conditions in the industry.
“We fully support an NLRB vote so every team member has a chance to a secret ballot vote on this important decision,” the company said in a statement. “Volkswagen is proud of our working environment in Chattanooga that provides some of the best-paying jobs in the area.”
Another UAW-backed union election at an Alabama Mercedes plant will follow this week’s election. Workers at the Mercedes plant filed for a union election with the NLRB this month after a supermajority signed cards with the UAW.
If pro-union workers win this week, it would be the first victory in the UAW’s new effort to unionize nonunion shops nationwide. The union has set its sights on 13 automakers operating in the U.S., including Tesla, VW, Nissan, Honda and Mercedes.
UAW President Shawn Fain announced the expanded unionization effort late last year after the union secured record contracts with Detroit automakers Ford, General Motors and Stellantis.
• Vaughn Cockayne can be reached at vcockayne@washingtontimes.com.
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