The voting at the two Mercedes factories comes a month after the UAW scored a breakthrough victory at Volkswagen’s assembly factory in Tennessee.
FILE - United Auto Workers union supporters attend a rally, Saturday, May 4, 2024, in Birmingham, Ala. The United Auto Workers union faces the latest test of its ambitious plan to unionize auto plants in the historically nonunion South when a vote ends Friday, May 17, at two Mercedes -Benz factories near Tuscaloosa, Ala.TUSCALOOSA, Ala.
The loss slows the union’s effort to organize 150,000 workers at more than a dozen nonunion auto factories largely in the South. A victory at the Mercedes plants would have represented a huge plum for the union, which has long struggled to overcome the enticements that Southern states have bestowed on foreign automakers, including tax breaks, lower labor costs and a nonunion workforce.Yet the UAW has been operating from a stronger position than in the past. Besides its victory in Chattanooga, it achieved generous new contracts last fall after striking against Detroit Big 3 automakers: General Motors, Stellantis and Ford.
About 5,200 workers at the Mercedes plants were eligible to vote on the UAW, the union’s first election there. Balloting was run by the National Labor Relations Board. If the union had won, it would have been a huge momentum booster for the UAW as it seeks to organize more factories, said Marick Masters, a professor emeritus at Wayne State University’s business school who has long studied the union.
The loss could lead workers at other nonunion plants to wonder why Mercedes employees voted against the union. But Masters said he doesn’t think it will slow down the union.
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