UAW Wins Again In The South
"The new jobs of the South will be union jobs," said Tim Smith, a regional director for the United Auto Workers, after the union announced Tuesday that 1,000 workers at Ultium Cells in Spring Hill, Tennessee had voted to form a collective bargaining unit.
The vote made the electric vehicle battery plant the second Ultium Cells workplace to join the UAW, and the second auto industry plant in the U.S. South to vote in favor of unionization following the launch of a major $40 million organizing effort in the region this year.
Anti-union companies such as EV automaker Tesla have eyed the South as a region to make a manufacturing push, due to its historical antagonism toward labor and low levels of unionization.
But Smith said the vote at Ultium Cells proves that "in the battery plants and EV factories springing up from Georgia to Kentucky to Texas, workers know they deserve the same strong pay and benefits our members have won. And we're going to make sure they have the support they need to win their unions and win their fair share."