UAW President: Union Adjusting As Auto Industry Electrifies

The UAW has ample resources to organize new companies building electric vehicles, union President Ray Curry says. 

With its influence in the auto industry slipping with the emergence of non-union transplants, which represent a steadily increasing share of automotive production in the U.S., the UAW has set aside money for organizing drives at Volkswagen and Nissan plants in the South, Curry says during an Automotive Press Assn. webinar in Detroit. 

He expects the UAW’s next Constitutional Convention in July to continue approving money for future organizing drives. “We have the resources we need,” says Curry, who served as the union’s financial secretary before becoming UAW president in July 2021. 

In the past at least some of the money for organizing came from the UAW’s multimillion-dollar strike fund. 

Curry notes today’s reality is that new electric-vehicle assembly and battery plants are replacing factories that once built internal-combustion engines and ICE-powered cars. The UAW is in talks with General Motors about organizing workers at battery plants under development in Lordstown, OH, and Spring Hill, TN.  

Those plants, however, are not yet fully “populated,” making it difficult for the union to call for voluntary recognition as hourly workers’ bargaining agent. In addition, the battery plants are joint ventures between GM and two South Korean companies and fall outside traditional automaker agreements.

The union hasn’t given up on efforts to organize workers at VW in Chattanooga, TN (pictured, below), or at Nissan in Canton, MS, UAW officials say. 

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Some of the new EV plants, notably Rivian’s, which occupies the old Mitsubishi factory in Normal, IL, are in areas of traditional UAW support, Curry notes. In addition, what Curry calls “union density” is slowly increasing in places such as North Carolina, where he was first hired as an assembler at a Daimler Truck plant in 1992. 

The trend toward insourcing more core components, such as electric motors, inverters and batteries, gives the UAW a chance to expand its membership, Curry says. The supply-chain shakeup that has led to temporary layoffs and stalled production also could lead to new opportunities for the union, because more manufacturing is being brought back to the U.S., he says. 

The union, however, has tried and failed to organize Tesla workers. Curry says he would like to see something more substantial than disparaging tweets and other remarks from Tesla CEO Elon Musk.  

If Musk was serious about letting workers at Tesla’s plants in Fremont, CA, Reno, NV, and a new facility in Austin, TX, vote on union representation, then he would drop an appeal of a U.S. National Labor Relations Board ruling that Tesla violated U.S. labor law and “reinstate some workers who were actually terminated,” Curry (pictured, below left) says.  

“That would be a good faith effort if they were interested in having that type of exchange,” he says.  

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In 2021 the NLRB, after a lengthy investigation and legal dispute, ordered Tesla to rehire the fired workers, give them back pay and post signs at its plants informing workers of their rights to organize a union and listing what the company is not allowed to do in retaliation.  

Using its new Texas headquarters as the company’s home address, Tesla’s lawyers appealed the ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in New Orleans, a court noted for its hostility to unions. The court has yet to announce its decision on Tesla’s appeal.  

The NLRB also ordered Musk to delete a tweet in which he mocked the UAW. But as recently as this week, he tweeted: “UAW slogan – ‘Fighting for the right to embezzle money from auto workers!’   

“The UAW stole millions from workers, whereas Tesla has made many workers millionaires (via stock grants). Subtle, but important difference,” Musk added, referring to the case of an officer at a Detroit-area UAW local who pleaded guilty to charges of stealing $2 million from union accounts to support his gambling habit.  

Recent scandals in which a dozen union staff members and top officers have pleaded guilty to various federal charges has made the UAW an easy target for Musk.  

Curry, however, notes the theft of money from UAW Local 412 was uncovered thanks to reforms instituted by the union in the wake of the scandals.