The South has few unionized auto plants. Workers say this one could be next.
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CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. - Growing up in eastern Tennessee, Jeremy Collins didn’t know many people with unionized jobs. But he remembers reading good things about unions fighting for the eight-hour work day and against child labor.
That’s why Collins plans to vote yes when employees at his Volkswagen factory decide this week whether to join the United Auto Workers. And he thinks many of his co-workers will do the same - possibly making their factory one of the few auto plants in the South to unionize.
Of 26 Volkswagen workers who stopped to talk to a Washington Post reporter outside the factory gates this month, more than two-thirds said they planned to vote yes in the historic ballot that will test the UAW’s strategy of organizing a dozen automakers’ southern factories. Six workers said they were undecided and two were opposed.
“I’m pretty vocal about the union at work, and I usually ask a lot of people how they feel,” Collins said, en route to his shift building Atlas SUVs and electric ID.4 vehicles. “And from all the people I talk to, I’ve only come across three people who are against it.”
Those who spoke with The Post are a small fraction of the more than 4,000 workers eligible to vote in the ballot. And the UAW has failed in two previous efforts to organize the factory, in 2014 and 2019. But the union is expressing optimism this time around, saying that a supermajority of workers signed union authorization cards supporting UAW membership.
Volkswagen Chattanooga would be the first auto plant in the South to unionize through an election since the 1940s, although there are other unionized auto factories in the South.
The union drive in Chattanooga is happening as both President Biden and former president Trump vie to make the case that they can deliver for blue-collar factory workers. A yes vote, even in red Tennessee, could help shore up Biden’s support among union voters across the United States, including those still dubious about the improved economy. Biden’s staunch support of union workers has earned him the UAW’s endorsement and assistance on the campaign trail from its fiery president, Shawn Fain.
Tennessee Republicans have seized on that relationship in their efforts to thwart the unionization drive. In an impromptu news conference next to the factory this month, local Republicans warned that workers in this right-leaning county would be aligning themselves with the Democrats by voting yes.
“I hope that the Tennessee workers will recognize that the UAW represents the party of President Joe Biden, and their values and political contributions, which are completely inconsistent with the people of southeast Tennessee,” state Sen. Bo Watson told attendees.
The conservative editorial page of the Chattanooga Times Free Press has carried similar messages, as has a mysterious website that workers say appeared recently, stillnouaw.com, which features photos of Biden and Fain and a social media post from former president Donald Trump attacking the UAW president. During a visit to Chattanooga last week, Republican Gov. Bill Lee cautioned that joining the union would be “a big mistake.”
Some conservative VW workers say they wish politicians would butt out.
“I really don’t appreciate what our local leaders have said about the UAW. I think they should have stayed out of it,” Ethan Triplett, a VW worker who votes Republican, said as he arrived for his shift. “I’ve seen what the UAW can do for all the plants up north and everything. … And I feel like they can do some good down here.”
Triplett and others said their main complaints include the factory’s inflexible sick-day policies and its tendency to haul in workers for compulsory overtime shifts on Saturdays. They also want better retirement and health-care benefits.
The election stakes are high for the UAW and its new president. The union scored big contract wins after striking against Ford, General Motors and Stellantis last year, but union membership has fallen precipitously in recent decades and continued to drop by 3.3 percent last year, to 370,000 workers. A team of UAW staffers has decamped to Chattanooga to help run the election drive, working on laptops at the union hall of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), where the UAW is renting space.
Although this would be the UAW’s first foray in the South at a foreign auto plant, both GM and Ford have UAW factories in Kentucky, Tennessee and Texas. Those had an easier path to unionization through procedures included in the automakers’ national agreements with the union.
VW says it is remaining neutral on the unionization effort. The union has disputed that, accusing the company of destroying union materials in a factory break room and other union-busting behavior. The company refutes the allegations, saying it is standard VW procedure to clear break rooms of all stray materials every day.
The factory is VW’s only plant worldwide that isn’t represented by a union or a similar body that advocates for workers. “We respect our employees’ right to decide who represents them in the workplace and have throughout this process,” Volkswagen said in a statement about the Chattanooga vote, adding that it is proud of the working conditions and pay it offers.
The average production worker in Chattanooga will earn more than $60,000 this year before overtime and bonuses, with hourly wages ranging from $23.40 to $32.40, the company said. Skilled team leaders earn up to $42.25 an hour. Since 2009, VW has invested more than $4.3 billion in the factory, making it one of the biggest employers in this picturesque city on the Tennessee River, in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains.
Charles Wood, head of the local chamber of commerce, said he worries that unionization could cause VW to shift more investment to its factory in Puebla, Mexico. That plant is unionized, but its workers earn less, making it a cheaper place to produce.
“The risk for Chattanooga is we become less competitive long-term,” he said, adding that VW has played a huge role in helping the region recover from factory closures and tough economic times that started in the 1960s.
Sarah Roberts, who works in the factory’s logistics department, said she plans to vote no, because she developed negative views of unions while growing up in Michigan. Her father, an automotive engineer, worked stints in various auto factories, trying to improve their manufacturing processes, she said. “Out of all the plants he’s been in, every one that has been under the UAW for more than 10 years is now shut down,” she said.
Among some conservative workers, the UAW’s endorsement of Biden is not helping the union’s case.
Members of a worker committee helping organize the drive say some workers have bashed the Biden endorsement. Kelcey Smith, one of dozens on the committee, said he heard a colleague tell a union meeting a few months ago that some people on the factory floor were upset about it.
“He believed that it was having an effect on some of the minds of some of the workers as far as voting for the union was concerned,” Smith said in an interview. UAW staffers at the meeting advised workers to reassure colleagues that they can vote for whomever they like.
Most workers who spoke with The Post said they are focusing more on workplace issues than politics.
The union “can support whoever they want,” said Krantzsy Boursiquot, a worker who described himself as apolitical and a nonvoter. Like others, he is most concerned about mandatory overtime on Saturdays, which the company sometimes calls with only two days’ notice, and managers’ refusal at times to approve sick days.
“I feel like, as they’re pushing for excellence every year, coming up with a new model every year, trying to increase profits for their shareholders, they should have that same energy when it comes down to their employees. And they don’t,” Boursiquot said.
Volkswagen spokesman Michael Lowder said the company has several channels for employee feedback and takes worker input seriously.
Gathering on a recent evening at the IBEW union hall, workers on the unionization organizing committee said they are pushing for stronger benefits.
Yolanda Peoples, who used to belong to the UAW when she worked at a now closed General Motors factory in Doraville, Ga., says she wants better health-care coverage that will reduce her out-of-pocket costs for medication. She would also like a defined-benefit pension instead of the 401(k) that VW provides.
“The 401(k) is based on the stock market … and whether it’s up or down,” she said. “I want more stability.”
VW contributes 4 percent of an employee’s pay to the 401(k) if the worker contributes 5 percent, VW spokesman Lowder said. The company also contributes 5 percent of each employee’s paycheck to a separate defined contribution plan, with no employee contribution required, he said.
Robert Soderstrom, who builds car doors, hopes a union can help protect workers from having to do the jobs of two people when someone calls in sick. “Oftentimes we won’t have a full crew,” he said. “If we’re a man short, they’ll be like, well, Robert, today you’re working two [jobs] … they’re not slowing the line down.”
Outside the factory gates, Justin DeLong stopped briefly to voice his support for the UAW, saying that many of his relatives in Upstate New York are union workers.
“I don’t understand why the South is afraid of unionization,” he said before rushing through the turnstile to his shift.
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