VW workers in Tennessee vote to unionize, giving UAW first win in the South

Workers at Volkswagen's Chattanooga plant in Tennessee voted overwhelmingly to join the UAW, a potentially industry-altering move that represents a breakthrough in the union's long-running crusade to organize transplant automakers in the southern U.S.

The UAW claimed victory with 2,628 votes in favor and 985 opposed, according to the National Labor Relations Board, which must still certify the results.

The victory comes after two failed attempts this past decade to organize the Chattanooga plant and gives VW its first UAW-represented facility in the U.S. since closing its Westmoreland, Pa., assembly plant in 1988. Union supporters pushed for the vote after the UAW ratified historically rich contracts with the Detroit 3, making the case that VW workers could get better pay, benefits and job security.

“It’s been quite a journey getting here; I’m just overjoyed,” Kelcey Smith, a 48-year-old VW worker who started at the plant last year, told Automotive News Friday. “People were just ready. Based off what went on up north, people had something to look for. The time was right, the energy was right. We had a great support system.”

"We saw the big contract that UAW workers won at the (Detroit 3) and that got everybody talking," Zachary Costello, a trainer in VW's proficiency room, said in a statement released Friday by the UAW. "You see the pay, the benefits, the rights UAW members have on the job, and you see how that would change your life. That's why we voted overwhelmingly for the union."

VW, in a statement, said: "We will await certification of the results by the NLRB. Volkswagen thanks its Chattanooga workers for voting in this election."

The election was widely seen as a barometer for the union's ability to succeed in its $40 million effort to organize 13 automakers with U.S. assembly plants. The win gives the UAW a long-sought foothold in the South and could become a springboard for other victories as the union attempts to reverse its declining membership, which last year fell to its lowest level since 2009.

"I think we're going to win a lot," UAW President Shawn Fain told Automotive News this month. "Once you see the first domino fall, you're going to see a lot more follow."

The union's next test comes in less than a month. Workers at Mercedes-Benz's assembly plant in Vance, Ala., will hold an election May 13-17.

The UAW's victory follows two previous defeats in Chattanooga.

In 2014 VW workers voted against UAW representation by a small margin. In 2019, amid the worst corruption scandal in the UAW's history, the election was even tighter but workers again rejected a bid to unionize. In this latest push, labor experts described Chattanooga as the low-hanging fruit for the UAW, given the close results in the past.

The UAW used lessons from those past failures, as well as a revamped, worker-led organizing strategy, to secure victory. It was able to overcome resistance from politicians including Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, a Republican, who argued that a union representing workers at the VW plant would be "a big mistake." Lee is one of six governors in the South who publicly opposed the unionization campaigns in a Tuesday statement.

President Joe Biden, in a statement released by the White House, congratulated the VW workers and chided the Republican governors for their opposition. "Together, these union wins have helped raise wages and demonstrate once again that the middle-class built America and that unions are still building and expanding the middle class for all workers," the statement said.

"Six Republican governors wrote a letter attempting to influence workers’ votes by falsely claiming that a successful vote would jeopardize jobs in their states. Let me be clear to the Republican governors that tried to undermine this vote: there is nothing to fear from American workers using their voice and their legal right to form a union if they so choose."

According to the NLRB, both parties have five business days to file challenges to the election. If there are no challenges, the results will be certified. The union will then work to establish representation, likely through UAW Local 42, which was created in the 2014 organizing attempt. Once the results are certified, VW is legally obligated to bargain in good faith for a contract.

Fain told Automotive News last month that the union would start to work on securing a contract immediately.

"We focus so much on the election but the election's just the first step," Fain said. "We've seen it over and over in this country, where workers vote to organize and form a union, and then spend years trying to get a first contract and the companies just delay and draw it out."

The UAW in 2015 organized a subset of skilled trades workers at the Chattanooga plant but VW contested the results and refused to bargain.

"We're going to push immediately to get to a first contract," Fain said, "and we're going to fight like hell and do whatever we have to do to make that happen."

Chattanooga was the only VW plant worldwide without some form of worker representation. Half of the automaker's global supervisory board is made up of labor representatives.

Production at the plant began in 2011. Chattanooga workers had their first formal meeting with the UAW in September of that year.