UAW President Shawn Fain, center, speaks with Mercedes workers in Tuscaloosa, Alabama on May 17, 2024 after workers at two Alabama Mercedes-Benz factories voted overwhelmingly against joining the United Auto Workers union. – The United Auto Workers on Friday accused Mercedes of interfering in a union election at two Alabama factories by intimidating and coercing workers into voting no., the labor group filed an objection with the National Labor Relations Board.
A Mercedes-Benz spokesperson emailed a company statement that said more than 90% of team members voted in the election, and a “majority indicated they are not interested in being represented by the UAW for purposes of collective bargaining.” Employees at Mercedes battery and assembly plants near Tuscaloosa voted 56% against the union. The result handed the union a setback in its efforts to unionize workers at auto plants in the Deep South. The defeat in Alabama came a month after theat Volkswagen’s 4,300-worker assembly factory in Chattanooga, Tennessee.