Thousands of Mercedes-Benz workers in Alabama voted against joining the United Auto Workers (UAW) on Friday, handing the union a significant defeat one month after it won at a Volkswagen plant in adjacent Tennessee.
The National Labor Relations Board reported that workers at two Mercedes-Benz plants near Tuscaloosa, Alabama, voted against joining the union by a majority of 2,642 to 2,045, or 56% to 44%.
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The result stymies the UAW’s momentum as it strives to organize new facilities throughout the South, where it has fought for decades to establish a presence.
Analysts predicted a difficult struggle at the Alabama Mercedes-Benz factories because the business ran an anti-union campaign, but Volkswagen executives had been neutral on worker organization activities.
Many observers were surprised by the union’s landslide victory last month at a Volkswagen facility in Chattanooga, Tennessee. This was the first time a car plant in the South had voted to unionize since the 1940s.
During both recent elections, the union faced fierce resistance from local elected politicians. Six Southern governors, including Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey and Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, both Republicans, released a statement last month criticizing UAW organizing attempts in the region.
“We want to keep good-paying jobs and continue to grow the American auto manufacturing sector here,” the governors stated in a letter. “A successful unionization drive will stop this growth in its tracks, to the detriment of American workers.”
In recent months, UAW officials have promoted an aggressive drive to increase the union’s membership. Over 10,000 non-union auto workers have signed cards in support of the UAW, and organizing campaigns have begun at more than two dozen facilities, according to a union statement released in March.
The surge in activity came when UAW members staged a high-profile strike against the Big Three automakers in the United States last fall: Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis, formerly Chrysler.
The dispute cost the corporations billions of dollars and temporarily laid off thousands of employees. But the gamble paid off, allowing the UAW to obtain unprecedented wage increases and other long-awaited reforms.
In recent years, the U.S. labor movement has increased in popularity and garnered headlines with attention-grabbing strikes, but it has failed to increase the proportion of the national workforce that is unionized.
A Gallup poll from last year found that 67% of Americans support unions, the highest percentage since 1965.
Nonetheless, union membership has fallen. Only 10% of U.S. workers belonged to unions last year, barely changing from the previous year, according to data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. However, this statistic represents a significant decrease from a high of nearly 25% in the 1950s.
The UAW’s setback in Alabama on Friday represents a missed opportunity for membership growth, as a vote to join would have added approximately 5,000 workers to the union’s membership rolls. The UAW currently claims to represent approximately 400,000 workers.
