Mercedes-Benz workers in Alabama vote against UAW union membership

United Auto Workers (UAW) members and supporters on a picket line exterior the ZF Chassis Programs plant in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, US, on Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2023.

Andi Rice | Bloomberg | Getty Photography

Mercedes-Benz workers in Alabama possess voted against union representation by the United Auto Workers, the Nationwide Labor Household Board acknowledged Friday.

The implications are a blow to the UAW’s organizing efforts a month after the Detroit union won an organizing power of roughly 4,330 Volkswagen plant workers in Tennessee. Vote casting started Monday and ended Friday.

Union organizing failed with 56% of the vote, or 2,642 workers, casting ballots against the UAW, in accordance with the NLRB, which oversaw the election. Better than 90% of the 5,075 eligible Mercedes-Benz workers voted within the election, in accordance with the consequences.

The NLRB acknowledged 51 ballots possess been challenged and no longer counted, nevertheless they’re no longer determinative to the of the election. There possess been 5 void ballots.

The union and company possess 5 enterprise days to file objections to the election, including any alleged interference, in accordance to the NLRB. If no objections are filed, the election result shall be licensed, and the union will must wait 365 days to file for a union election for a an identical bargaining unit.

Mercedes-Benz in a observation acknowledged company officials “scrutinize forward to continuing to work straight with our Group Contributors to be definite [Mercedes-Benz US International] is no longer only their employer of desire, nevertheless a procedure they would indicate to traffic and household.”

United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain (honest) and UAW Secretary-Treasurer Margaret Mock (left) lead a march exterior Stellantis’ Ram 1500 plant in Sterling Heights, Michigan after the union known as a strike at the plant on Oct. 23, 2023.

Michael Wayland / CNBC

The loss is expected to hurt the UAW in an unparalleled organizing power launched leisurely final year of 13 non-union automakers within the U.S. after securing file contracts with Detroit automakers Ford Motor, Long-established Motors and Stellantis. Those agreements integrated indispensable wage develop, reinstatement of mark-of-living adjustments and completely different benefits.

UAW President Shawn Fain acknowledged whereas the Mercedes-Benz vote used to be obviously no longer the the union wanted, it used to be a daring effort, including the vote “is rarely forever a failure” nevertheless a “bump within the road.”

“While this loss stings, I will declare you this, we will support our heads up, assist our heads up high. These workers possess nothing to be triumphant in nevertheless be proud within the effort they save forth and what they’ve completed,” he acknowledged Friday all thru a media convention. “We fought the correct battle and we will proceed on, proceed forward. Within the kill, these workers right here are going to build up.”

The Mercedes-Benz vote used to be expected to be more tough for the union than the Volkswagen plant in Tennessee, the put the union had already established a presence after two failed organizing drives within the previous decade and the put it faced less opposition from the automaker.

Stephen Silvia, creator of “The UAW’s Southern Gamble: Organizing Workers at International-Owned Car Crops,” famend Mercedes-Benz replaced the plant’s leader weeks sooner than the election. He acknowledged companies robotically put this, promising workers adjustments at their facilities in articulate to stave of organizing.

“Corporations put anti-union campaigns on legend of they would perchance furthermore furthermore be effective, and I contain this one used to be effective,” acknowledged Silvia, a professor at American University in Washington, D.C. “An identical old portion of an anti-union campaign is firing the plant supervisor … That appears to possess persuaded adequate of the staff to vote against the union.”

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey, who used to be one amongst six Republican governors to condemn the union’s organizing power, hailed the of the vote.

“The workers in Vance possess spoken, and so that they possess spoken clearly! Alabama is no longer Michigan, and we’re no longer the Sweet Home to the UAW. We urge the UAW to admire the consequences of this secret pollelection,” she acknowledged.

Workers at Mercedes-Benz’s Tuscaloosa plant, positioned about 60 miles southwest of Birmingham, possess produced higher than 4 million vehicles for the reason that plant opened in 1997, including 295,000 vehicles in 2023, in accordance to the plant’s web role.

The Alabama plant currently produces vehicles such because the gasoline-powered GLE and GLS Maybach SUVs besides the all-electrical EQS and EQE SUVs.

The NLRB final week acknowledged it continues to task and investigate commence unfair labor reveal expenses filed by the UAW against automakers, including six unfair labor reveal expenses against Mercedes-Benz since March.

Fain acknowledged Friday the union would proceed to switch forward with these expenses. He declined to converse whether the union plans to anguish the election results, announcing he’d “lunge away that” to the union’s ethical personnel.

The expenses articulate that Mercedes-Benz has “disciplined workers for discussing unionization at work, prohibited distribution of union materials and paraphernalia, surveilled workers, discharged union supporters, forced workers to support captive viewers conferences, and made statements suggesting that union activity is futile,” the NLRB acknowledged.

The union has filed completely different expenses against automakers Honda, Hyundai, Lucid, Rivian, Tesla and Toyota, in accordance with the NLRB.