United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain, middle, visits striking UAW Local 551 workers outside a Ford assembly center on South Burley Avenue on Saturday, Oct. 7, 2023, in Chicago.
John J. Kim | Tribune News Service | Getty Images
The United Auto Workers union is launching an unprecedented campaign to organize 13 non-union automakers in the U.S. after bargaining record contracts with the Detroit automakers.
The union said Wednesday the drive will cover nearly 150,000 autoworkers across with BMW, Honda, Hyundai, Lucid, Mazda, Mercedes, Nissan, Rivian, Subaru, Tesla, Toyota, Volkswagen and Volvo.
As part of the campaign workers are signing electronic cards in support of union efforts to potentially organize U.S. plants from those automakers.
It is not guaranteed that the union would push to organize every plant or automaker that participates in the campaign. Overall, workers would need to vote in support of UAW representation.
UAW President Shawn Fain has said the union’s next mission after ratifying record contracts with General Motors, Ford Motor and Stellantis. Those contracts include at least 25% hourly pay raises, the reinstatement of cost-of-living adjustments and enhanced profit-sharing payments, among other benefits.
“To all the autoworkers out there working without the benefits of a union: Now it’s your turn,” Fain said in a video posted online.
Several non-union automakers such as Hyundai, Toyota and Honda announced plans to increase worker wages following the UAW deals.
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