A Message to UAW Stellantis Members
In our 2023 contract, we made major gains. We won the reinstatement of COLA, the elimination of wage tiers, billions in product investments, and the reopening of the Belvidere Assembly Plant. Over the life of the agreement, UAW members at Stellantis will see raises ranging from $8.69 an hour to $24.68 per hour.
But less than a year later, Stellantis was attempting to back out of its end of the agreement, indefinitely delaying the reopening of Belvidere Assembly, laying off thousands of workers, and planning to move production of the Dodge Durango to Canada. Ford, GM, and the rest of the market was making money hand over fist. The problem wasn’t the market, it was Carlos Tavares. We said Record Profits mean Record Contracts.
He wanted to turn those Record Contracts into Record Layoffs. In the past, our union leadership would have rolled over and let the company shutter plants and gut communities, but not this time. We knew we couldn’t let that happen: we won the right to strike over plant closures in our 2023 contract and we were not about to lay down and accept another plant closure. So, we launched our Keep The Promise campaign to put the pressure on CEO Carlos Tavares and demand that Stellantis fulfill the commitments it made to our membership.
Thousands of Stellantis workers signed the strike pledge, held local rallies, and sent a clear message to Tavares and the company that we weren’t backing down, even if that meant going back out on strike. It worked. Carlos Tavares was forced to resign, and in January, the company recommitted billions of dollars in investments, and to the reopening of Belvidere Assembly. Keep the Promise was our union’s first-ever national contract enforcement campaign, and, thanks to the resilience of our members, it was a major success. This report explains why we launched the campaign, how our members won, and where we go moving forward. While this is a great outcome, the fight isn’t over. There are still thousands of Stellantis workers laid off. We still have broken trade policies that make it far too easy for corporations to ship jobs out of the country. There’s more to do. But if there’s one thing we’ve learned throughout this campaign, it’s that when we stand together, we can take on powerful corporations and win.
In Solidarity,
Shawn Fain
UAW President
Kevin Gotinsky, Director
UAW Stellantis Department
This is an official UAW all-member department report, issued by the UAW Stellantis Department and produced jointly with the UAW Communications Department. The UAW periodically issues all-member reports when critical information must be widely communicated to the membership.
