Workers at Volkswagen’s factory in Chattanooga, Tennessee, have voted to join the United Auto Workers (UAW) union. It’s the UAW’s latest victory in its long road to its goal of organizing every manufacturing plant operated by a major automaker in the United States.
After months of on-the-ground efforts by organizers, Volkswagen workers went to the polls last week to vote. The union won 2,628 votes or about 73% of the 3,613 workers who cast their ballots, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) said Friday. Ten other ballots were either voided or challenged, while the remaining 703 workers didn’t participate.
“It’s you who made this happen. I want to give a shoutout to all the badass members here who put in the blood, the sweat, and the tears to fight for a better life,” UAW President Shawn Fain told workers on Friday night, noting that the union has been trying to organize the Chattanooga plant for at least a decade.
It’s a stunning turnaround from the last time the UAW sought to organize the factory, which, until now, was Volkswagen’s only nonunion plant in the world. In 2019, just 776 workers voted in favor of joining the UAW compared to 833 workers who voted against organizing.
But that was before the UAW took General Motors, Ford Motor Co., and Stellantis to task across several weeks of rolling walkouts and picketing. When the dust settled, the Detroit Three automakers agreed to record contracts that provide workers with major pay raises and benefits.
“We saw the big contract that UAW workers won at the Big Three and that got everybody talking,” Zachary Costello, a trainer in Volkswagen’s proficiency room, said in a statement. “You see the pay, the benefits, the rights UAW members have on the job, and you see how that would change your life.”
In a statement posted online, Volkswagen thanked its workers in Chattanooga for voting in the election. Including Monday, the company has five business days to file objections to the election before it is certified by the NLRB.
Volkswagen is just the first conquered carmaker in the UAW’s push to organize all 14 auto companies with nonunion plants in the U.S. The union has dedicated $40 million to organize workers at plants operated Nissan, Hyundai Motor, Subaru, and Tesla. More than 10,000 workers have signed union cards in recent months, according to a UAW tally.
“You guys are leading the way,” Fain told workers Friday. “We’re going to carry this fight on to Mercedes and everywhere else.”
Mercedes workers in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, filed a petition for a union election to have the UAW represent the more than 5,000 workers at the factory. Workers there head to the polls on May 13.