How the UAW is winning over new plants -- starting with Volkswagen

There are even signs that some executives are giving up the fight. Starbucks and its union in February announced a commitment to work together to resolve hostilities and hammer out collective bargaining agreements for the coffee chain’s 400 now-unionized cafes.

While the UAW has filed complaints alleging illegal tactics by VW, pro-union employees say pressure in the US and Germany led the automaker to take an overall less hostile approach to the campaign this time around. When the UAW petitioned the NLRB last month to hold an election, VW quickly reached an agreement for a vote — rather than dragging out the process with disputes over issues like which sorts of employees could participate. The company also chose not to bring back the law firm Littler, which represented it in the 2019 showdown.

“We respect our employees’ right to decide who represents them in the workplace and have throughout this process,” Volkswagen said in an emailed statement.

Even if the union wins there this week, the road to organizing long-sought targets like Tesla, which has fiercely resisted organizing, is long. “It will obviously have a positive impact at Tesla. But I think that the battle at Tesla is going to be a Battle Royale,” said Nelson Lichtenstein, a labor historian at the University of California at Santa Barbara, who wrote a book on the UAW. “Believe it or not they think that organizing in the South is easier than organizing at Tesla. And they may be right.”

Plenty of politicians and managers vocally oppose the union.

At Mercedes-Benz, Michael Göbel, who oversees production in North America, wrote a letter to employees in January saying “collective bargaining is an uncertain process with no time limit, and there is no guarantee you will be satisfied with the outcome.” The next month, he held a meeting with the plant’s workforce and suggested that a union would mean strikes, costly dues and obstacles to conflict resolution.

The UAW has brought legal complaints against Mercedes in both the US and Germany, alleging anti-union tactics including firing an employee at the Alabama plant because of his support for the union.

In an emailed statement, Mercedes said it “has not interfered with or retaliated against any team member in their right to pursue union representation” and “firmly denies it has made any adverse employment decision” because of an employee’s support for the UAW.

At a press conference near the VW plant earlier this month, standing at a podium with a “Protect Our Jobs” sign, Tennessee state senator Bo Watson said, “voting against the UAW is protecting Tennessee’s values.” In Alabama, where the UAW has made inroads at a Hyundai plant, too, Governor Kay Ivey has denounced the union as a “threat from Detroit” and warned that “the Alabama model for economic success is under attack.”

Fain doesn’t disagree. “She’s damn right it is!” he said at a rally earlier this month. “It’s under attack because workers are fed up with getting screwed.”