Tag Archive for: Mercedes

VANCE, Ala. –  5,000 Mercedes workers will have an opportunity to vote to form their union in less than a month.  The election will be held in-person at the Mercedes plant May 13 – 17 in Vance, Alabama. The vote will be administered by the National Labor Relations Board.  

“Workers at our plant are ready for this moment,” said Jeremy Kimbrell, a Mercedes worker at the Vance plant. “We are ready to vote yes because we are ready to win our fair share. We are going to end the Alabama discount and replace it with what our state actually needs. Workers sticking together and sticking by our community.” 

“The time is now,” said Latesha Henry, a Mercedes worker at the Vance plant. “It’s time to regain family work life balance and make history at Mercedes. I want this to be a job that generation after generation would be proud to have.” 

The vote at Mercedes will come just a few weeks after workers at Volkswagen vote on unionizing with UAW in Chattanooga, Tennessee. That vote is currently underway, and it is anticipated that ballots will be counted Friday evening after voting ends.  

Should workers at both plants vote to unionize, nearly 10,000 autoworkers across the South will have voted to join UAW in less than a month. 

In addition to Mercedes and Volkswagen, thousands more autoworkers have signed union cards in recent months, with public campaigns at Hyundai in Montgomery, Ala. and Toyota in Troy, Mo. Workers at more than two dozen other facilities are actively organizing.  

“We’re tired of Mercedes executives rolling things back,” said Billy Guyton, a Mercedes worker at the Vance plant. “We’re going to roll our union forward.”  

For more information, visit uaw.org/join

VANCE, Ala. – A supermajority of Mercedes-Benz workers have filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) for a vote to join the UAW. The over 5,000 workers at the Mercedes plant outside Tuscaloosa, Ala., are the second group of Southern autoworkers to call for a union election in less than three weeks. Volkswagen workers in Chattanooga, Tenn., filed for their election in mid-March and will have their vote to join the UAW April 17–19.  

new video announcing the election filing at Mercedes features the Alabama autoworkers at a recent rally with UAW President Shawn Fain. In the video, Mercedes workers speak out on why they’re voting yes to join the UAW. (The media is invited to use footage from the video.) 

In a statement today, Jeremy Kimbrell, a measurement machine operator at Mercedes, said, “We are standing up for every worker in Alabama. At Mercedes, at Hyundai and at hundreds of other companies, Alabama workers have made billions of dollars for executives and shareholders, but we haven’t gotten our fair share. We’re going to turn things around with this vote. We’re going to end the Alabama discount.” 

“We are voting for safer jobs at Mercedes,” said Moesha Chandler, an assembly team member at Mercedes. “I’m still young, but I’m already having serious problems with my shoulders and hands. When you’re still in your twenties and your body is breaking down, that’s not right. By winning our union, we’ll have the power to make the work safer and more sustainable.” 

Mercedes management is running an aggressive anti-union campaign, but that has not blunted the workers’ momentum. By late February, less than two months after Mercedes workers went public with their drive to join the UAW, a majority of them had signed union cards. The Mercedes workers hope to be voting in their union election by early May. The NLRB is expected to quickly set the date for the election.  

The UAW has filed federal labor charges against Mercedes for illegal union busting, as well as charges in a German court for labor violations that could net billions in penalties for the German automaker. 

“We’re going to make Mercedes better with this vote,” said Jacob Ryan, a KVP team member at Mercedes. “Right now, the company keeps losing good people because they force them to work Saturdays at the last second, to take shifts that mess with their family lives. And the only choice people have is to take it or quit. With the union, we’ll have a voice for fair schedules that keep workers at Mercedes.” 

The Mercedes workers are part of the national movement of non-union autoworkers organizing to join the UAW in the wake of the historic Stand Up Strike victory at the Big Three auto companies. Over 10,000 non-union autoworkers have signed union cards in recent months, with public campaigns launched at Mercedes, Volkswagen, Hyundai in Montgomery, Ala., and Toyota in Troy, Mo. Workers at over two dozen other facilities are also actively organizing. For more information, visit uaw.org/join. 

The UAW filed charges today against Mercedes-Benz Group AG for violating Germany’s new law on global supply chain practices. Mercedes-Benz’s aggressive anti-union campaign against U.S. autoworkers in Alabama is a clear human rights violation under the German Act on Corporate Due Diligence Obligations in Supply Chains. If found guilty, Mercedes-Benz faces billions in penalties, including significant fines and bans on government contracts.

The UAW’s charges are an important early test of the act, which took effect on January 1, 2023, and applies to German-headquartered firms with more than 1,000 employees. The UAW is the first American union to file charges under the act, which is also known by its German acronym LkSG.

The law sets standards for global supply chains that German-based firms must adhere to, and it clearly prohibits companies from disregarding workers’ rights to form trade unions. Workers at Mercedes-Benz’s sprawling assembly and battery plant in Vance, Ala., are organizing to join the UAW and have faced fierce backlash from company management.

The Alabama plant is operated by Mercedes-Benz U.S. International (MBUSI), a subsidiary of Stuttgart-based Mercedes-Benz Group AG. The UAW complaint details how MBUSI has intimidated, threatened and even fired Alabama workers in violation of U.S. labor law and International Labour Organization Conventions. The complaint documents seven violations of the German act, including:

  • The firing of a union supporter with Stage 4 cancer. The employee had been allowed to have his cellphone with him at work so he could receive updates on the availability of his scarce chemo drug. But a supervisor who has intimidated union supporters claimed there was a zero-tolerance policy on cellphones and had him fired.
  • A January letter from MBUSI CEO Michael Göbel to employees that attempted to chill union activity and violated their freedom of association. The letter was filled with stock phrases used by anti-union consultants designed to stoke fear, uncertainty, and division.
  • A mandatory plant-wide meeting Göbel held in February to discourage workers from unionizing. At this meeting, Göbel told workers “I don’t believe the UAW can help us to be better” and that they “shouldn’t have to pay union dues that generate millions of dollars per year for an organization where you have no transparency where that money is used.”
  • Another mandatory plant-wide meeting in February that featured former University of Alabama football Coach Nick Saban. Before and during the meeting, MBUSI supervisors attempted to stop union supporters from passing out UAW hats.

Despite the company’s anti-union campaign, a majority of MBUSI workers have signed union cards and recently rallied with UAW President Shawn Fain.

In addition to the charges against Mercedes-Benz in Germany, the MBUSI workers have filed multiple charges with the U.S. National Labor Relations Board. Last week, the workers requested an injunction against MBUSI to put an end to the company’s retaliation against workers for standing up for their rights at work.

MBUSI’s actions not only violate U.S., German and international law, they also violate Mercedes-Benz’s Principles of Social Responsibility and Human Rights. Those principles state: “In the event of organization campaigns, the company and its executives shall remain neutral; the trade unions and the company will ensure that employees can make an independent decision.”

Every Mercedes-Benz plant in the world is unionized — except the company’s two plants in the United States. 

Mercedes workers are part of the national movement of non-union autoworkers organizing to join the UAW in the wake of the historic Stand Up Strike victory at the Big Three auto companies. Over 10,000 non-union autoworkers have signed union cards in recent months, with public campaigns launched at Mercedes, Volkswagen in Chattanooga, Tenn., Hyundai in Montgomery, Ala., and Toyota in Troy, Mo. Workers at over two dozen other facilities are also actively organizing. For more information, visit uaw.org/join.

VANCE, Ala. – Workers at Mercedes-Benz’s largest U.S. plant have filed multiple federal charges with the National Labor Relations Board in response to the company’s aggressive and illegal union-busting. Workers are requesting an injunction to put an end to the company’s retaliation against workers for standing up for their rights at work. In February, Mercedes workers announced that a majority of their coworkers at the Mercedes plant in Vance had signed union authorization cards. Every Mercedes plant in the world is unionized—except the company’s two plants in the United States. 

“Since we started organizing, I put in my FMLA leave with management multiple times and every time they said they lost the paperwork,” said Lakeisha Carter, a Mercedes employee in the battery plant. “I’m an outspoken union supporter and Mercedes illegally disciplined me for medical absences that were clearly covered by my FMLA requests. It’s just plain retaliation from Mercedes, but I’m not going to be intimidated.” 

In February, the U.S. Department of Labor recovered $438,625 in back wages, unpaid bonuses, and damages for two former workers at the Mercedes plant in Vance after management violated their rights to protected leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act. 

Al Ezell, a public union supporter in the Mercedes battery plant, has stage 4 lung cancer and supply chain issues have made it difficult for him to receive his medication. Al was given permission to have his phone on the factory floor in case his doctor called him about refilling his prescription. 

“Management called me into the office to discipline me for having my phone on the floor. My manager looked me in the face and told me she didn’t care that I have cancer or that I had permission, she was going to enforce the company’s zero tolerance policy,” said Ezell. “We’ve never had a zero-tolerance policy for having a phone on the floor. Management is just trying to scare us, but we won’t back down.”  

“Mercedes is forcing me and my coworkers to attend meetings and watch anti-union videos that are full of lies,” said Taylor Snipes, another worker in the Mercedes battery plant. “I finally had enough and asked my group leader if I had to watch the video and he treated me like a child, telling me I either had to watch the video or put my head down on the desk.” 

Later that day, Mr. Snipes was called into a meeting with Mercedes management and immediately fired for having his phone on the factory floor. Taylor had previously been given permission to have his phone on the floor so he could check for messages from his child’s day care center.  

“During the meeting, I told management that it was suspicious that I was being called into the office on the same day that I spoke up in anti-union meeting,” said Snipes. “My manager said the two had nothing to do with one another, but then proceeded to aggressively interrogate me about why I support having a union.” 

Mercedes workers are part of the national movement of non-union autoworkers organizing to join the UAW in the wake of the historic Stand Up Strike victory at the Big Three auto companies. Over 10,000 non-union autoworkers have signed union cards in recent months, with public campaigns launched at Mercedes, Volkswagen in Chattanooga, Tenn., Hyundai in Montgomery, Ala., and Toyota in Troy, Mo. Workers at over two dozen other facilities are also actively organizing. For more information, visit uaw.org/join

VANCE, AL — A majority of workers at Mercedes-Benz’s largest plant in the United States, MBUSI in Vance, Alabama, have signed union cards in support of joining the UAW.

In a video announcement, Mercedes worker Jeremy Kimbrell, surrounded by his Mercedes coworkers, announces that “a majority of our coworkers at Mercedes here in Alabama have signed our union cards and are ready to win our union and a better life with the UAW.”

The full text of the announcement, and the video, are available below and media are encouraged to use the materials.

Kimbrell details several of the driving forces behind the workers’ grassroots campaign to join the UAW, including workers going many years without meaningful raises, a two-tier wage system, and the abuse of temporary workers. Each of these issues also figured prominently in the UAW’s Stand Up Strike at the Big Three, which has spurred an unprecedented amount of organizing activity and interest among America’s non-union autoworkers.

“There comes a time when enough is enough,” says Kimbrell. “Now is that time. We know what the company, what the politicians, and what their multi-millionaire buddies will say. They’ll say now is not the right time. Or that this is not the right way. But here’s the thing. This is our decision. It’s our life. It’s our community. These are our families. It’s up to us.”

The announcement marks the second plant to reach the majority milestone this month, after Volkswagen workers in Chattanooga reached majority support in early February. Over ten thousand non-union autoworkers across 14 auto companies have signed union cards and begun organizing to join the UAW in the wake of the historic Stand Up Strike victories at the Big Three.

Full text of MBUSI workers’ announcement of majority support to join the UAW: 

“We’re here today to make a major announcement. 

A majority of our coworkers at Mercedes here in Alabama have signed our union cards and are ready to win our union and a better life with the UAW. 

We haven’t taken this step lightly. 

For years, we’ve fallen further behind while Mercedes has made billions. 

After 2008 and 2009, some of our coworkers were forced to leave the company.  

Consecutive CEOs said they’d be brought back once things improved.  

Things did improve, but they were never allowed to return and were replaced within six months by temporary workers at half the pay. 

These same temporary workers then worked for up to eight years before receiving full time jobs.  

Also during this time, our management gave us a 42 cent raise over a six year period while making record profits.  

And these same record profits weren’t enough to prevent Mercedes from imposing an unfair two-tier pay scale just as our children were entering the workforce.  

We’ve learned that we can’t trust Mercedes with our best interests.  

There comes a time when enough is enough.  

Now is that time.  

We know what the company, what the politicians, and what their multi-millionaire buddies will say.  

They’ll say now is not the right time.  

that this is not the right way.  

But here’s the thing.  

This is our decision.  

It’s our life.  

It’s our community.  

These are our families.  

It’s up to us.  

It’s not up to Mercedes management or any politician or anyone else.  

We’re exercising our right to fight for a better life.  

And we won’t stop until we’ve made things right for the workers who build the cars and make the company run.  

We organized our plant by ourselves.  

We are our union.  

So we’re here to tell you that we are the majority.  

That Mercedes workers are ready to stand up.  

And we’re asking all of you watching this, whether you’re an autoworker at Mercedes or just someone who believes in a better life for working class people in Alabama and beyond: stand with us.  

Support our cause, and join our movement.  

Thank you. 

Stand Up! 

DETROIT – The United Auto Workers is committing $40 million through 2026 in new organizing funds to support non-union autoworkers and battery workers who are organizing across the country, and particularly in the South. 

The UAW International Executive Board voted Tuesday to commit the funds in response to an explosion in organizing activity among non-union auto and battery workers, in order to meet the moment and grow the labor movement. 

In the next few years, the electric vehicle battery industry is slated to add tens of thousands of jobs across the country, and new standards are being set as the industry comes online. These jobs will supplement, and in some cases largely replace, existing powertrain jobs in the auto industry. Through a massive new organizing effort, workers will fight to maintain and raise the standard in the emerging battery industry. 

The major announcement comes on the heels of growing organizing momentum across the non-union auto sector, with workers at Volkswagen in Chattanooga announcing majority support for the union, and workers at Hyundai in Montgomery, Alabama and at Mercedes in Vance, Alabama following closely on their heels. 

More than ten thousand autoworkers have already signed their union cards to join the UAW and fight for a better life at 14 non-union automakers from California to South Carolina. To learn more about that campaign, visit UAW.org/join. 

Montgomery, Ala. — Workers at Hyundai’s sole US plant, in Montgomery, Alabama, have announced a major milestone in their campaign to join the UAW, with over 30 percent of autoworkers at the plant having signed union cards.

In a new video, “Montgomery Can’t Wait,” Hyundai workers speak out on the ties between the union movement at the Korean automaker and the civil rights legacy of “Montgomery, the city where Rosa Parks sat down, and where thousands of Hyundai workers are ready to Stand Up.”

The video announcing the campaign can be accessed at uaw.org/hyundai and the media is invited to use the footage.

“I’m getting close to retirement and the company has literally broken me down,” said Drena Smith, a team member who has spent most of her 19 years at Hyundai in the paint shop and has had rotator cuff surgery on both shoulders and carpal tunnel surgery in one hand. “We need compensation for that when we retire. Not just a cake and a car discount for a car we can’t afford to buy because we won’t have any income. We need a real retirement; we need to win our union.”

“My oldest son works at the plant, over on General Assembly (GA),” said Dewayne Naylor, who currently does Body Shop Quality Control. “I went through 14 years in GA, and I know what it’ll do to your body over there. I don’t want the younger generation to go through what we did. Over the last ten years, most of my raises have been just 12 or 13 cents an hour. The price of their cars, they go up every year. But my pay don’t. If we don’t get the union here, our pay will never keep up.”

“I was a temp at Hyundai from 2014 to 2017. I made $11.03 an hour the entire time,” said Ronald Terry, a team member on Final 3 and 5 in General Assembly. “They kept saying, just wait a little longer, you’ll make it to full time. I finally did, but the pay is still mediocre. With the union, we can bring our pay and benefits up to a higher standard. That’s how you motivate your workers. It’s not just good for us, it’s good for the product we produce.”

“When you’re injured, management pushes you back on the line too soon,” said Peggy Howard, who works on F1 Final in General Assembly. “I had surgery on my rotator cuff in September and I had to go back to work the last of December. I didn’t get the two weeks ramp up and now I’m having pains over again. I had a cortisone injection three weeks ago and I’m about to go back for another injection. If that doesn’t work, the doctor told me he’ll have to do the surgery over again. We need to make our jobs safer; we need the union.”

“Here’s when I knew we needed the union,” said Quichelle Liggins, a Quality Inspector at Hyundai. “My youngest son had a basketball game, and I scheduled a half day of vacation time. Someone was supposed to come to the line to relieve me, but no one came. Finally, I clocked out and I missed the first quarter of his game. They still wanted to write me up for job abandonment. I had to go in front of team relations, and I explained what happened, that I was legit in having this personal day. And my group leader stopped me and said this job is more important than your family. At that moment, I just froze. That was sickening. I knew things at Hyundai had gone too far.”

The announcement marks the third major breakthrough in the national movement of non-union autoworkers organizing to join the UAW in the wake of the historic Stand Up Strike victory at the Big Three auto companies. Over 10,000 non-union autoworkers have signed union cards in recent months, with public campaigns launched at Volkswagen in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and Mercedes in Vance, Alabama, while workers at over two dozen other facilities continue to organize.

Over 10,000 autoworkers across 13 non-union companies have signed union cards with the UAW, as momentum builds across the auto industry for better wages, benefits, and rights on the job. The major milestone comes less than 90 days after UAW members ratified record contracts at the Big Three. 

“Our Stand Up movement has caught fire among America’s autoworkers, far beyond the Big Three,” said UAW President Shawn Fain. “These workers are standing up for themselves, for their families, and for their communities, and our union will have their back every step of the way.” 

In the wake of the UAW’s historic Stand Up Strike victory at the Big Three automakers (Ford, GM, Stellantis), thousands of non-union autoworkers began organizing their own unions with the UAW across the entire non-union auto industry.  

In just two months, workers at Volkswagen in Chattanooga, Tenn., and at Mercedes in Vance, Ala., have gone public with their campaigns, nearing a majority of workers signed up at both plants. Workers at more than two dozen other facilities have begun organizing in the thousands, inspired by the Big Three victory and the non-union autoworkers’ public announcements. 

For more information on the non-union autoworkers’ organizing efforts at Volkswagen, Mercedes, Toyota, Honda, Volvo, Tesla, Nissan, BMW, Subaru, Mazda, Rivian, Lucid, and Hyundai, visit UAW.org/join

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — Workers at the Mercedes-Benz plant outside Tuscaloosa, Ala., went public today with their campaign to join the UAW. Over 30% of the plant’s workforce have signed union authorization cards, a major milestone on their path to form a union with the UAW.

A video announcing the campaign can be accessed at uaw.org/mercedes-al and the media is invited to use the footage.

The launch at Mercedes in Alabama comes just one month after Volkswagen workers in Chattanooga, Tenn., reached the 30% threshold and went public with their drive to join the UAW. It comes just six weeks after non-union autoworkers across the nation started organizing to join the UAW. For more information on that campaign, visit uaw.org/join.

“In the past, people didn’t know if we had a pathway forward here,” said Jeremy Kimbrell, a measurement machine operator who has worked at Mercedes since 1999. “Now everybody’s coming together and seeing what the pathway is, and it’s through the union. When we get our union in here, I think people will once again look at Mercedes and say, it’s not just another job, it’s a career job. It’s a job where generations will want to come and work. And that’ll spread out to the suppliers and then to the broader area.”

Mercedes made $156 billion in total profits over the last decade. In the last three years their profits grew 200% over the previous three years. From 2020 to 2023, the average price of Mercedes vehicles in the United States jumped 31% even as pay for Mercedes’ U.S. workers stagnated. Workers at the Tuscaloosa plant build the Mercedes GLE, GLE coupé and GLS model series as well as the all-electric EQS SUV and EQE.

Today, 33 U.S. Senators are calling on 13 non-union auto companies to refrain from union-busting as over 150,000 autoworkers have launched campaigns to organize with the UAW. In a letter sent to the CEOs of the automakers, the Senators, led by Senators Peters, Stabenow, Padilla, Butler, and Brown stressed the importance of respecting workers’ right to form a union, and encouraged the companies to commit to neutrality in any organizing effort.

“Your commitment to neutrality would ensure that management does not pressure workers into voting against unionization or delaying the election process,” the Senators’ letter states. “We believe a neutrality agreement is the bare minimum standard manufacturers should meet in respecting workers’ rights, especially as companies receive and benefit from federal funds related to the electric vehicle transition.”

The letter also addresses reports of illegal actions taken by a number of the companies. In recent weeks, the UAW has filed unfair labor practice charges at the National Labor Relations Board against Honda, Hyundai, and Volkswagen for engaging in various illegal union-busting tactics in an attempt to intimidate and dissuade workers from voting to unionize.

“These retaliatory actions are hostile to workers’ rights and must not be repeated if further organizing efforts are made by these companies’ workers,” the letter continues. “We therefore urge you all to commit to implementation of a neutrality agreement at your manufacturing plants.”

“Every autoworker in this country deserves their fair share of the auto industry’s record profits, whether at the Big Three or the Non-Union Thirteen,” UAW President Shawn Fain said. “We applaud these U.S. Senators for standing with workers who are standing up for economic justice on the job. It’s time for the auto companies to stop breaking the law and take their boot off the neck of the American autoworker, whether they’re at Volkswagen, Toyota, Tesla, or any other corporation doing business in this country.”

The campaign comes on the heels of the UAW winning record contracts at Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis in October 2023, after the six-week Stand Up Strike that captivated the labor movement and led non-union automakers to raise wages in anticipation of fending off potential organizing at their facilities.

More information on the organizing drive can be found at UAW.org/join.