TOLEDO, Ohio — UAW President Shawn Fain spoke to members via social media Monday to talk about the union's recent push to expand membership by unionizing new plants.
The move comes less than a week after an announcement that more than 1,000 UAW workers at Toledo Jeep Assembly complex will face layoffs in February.
Stellantis announced Dec. 7 that plans to lay off up to 1,225 workers at the Toledo Assembly Complex. The announcement came just a month after the automaker reached a contract deal with the United Auto Workers after the union's month-and-a-half strike against the Detroit Big 3.
Despite the recent layoff news -- which Fain did not mention in his prepared remarks -- the union president touted the new contracts with domestic automakers as a strength that should attract new members.
"We have contracts that mean management can't just do whatever they want when they want," Fain said.
During a question-and-answer session after his remarks Fain he has meetings set up with Stellantis this week to discuss the potential layoffs, including protections in the contract just approved by members that would not allow for layoffs to happen.
"This is a national movement of auto workers fighting for auto workers," Fain said.
Hot off their success negotiating new contracts with Detroit's automakers, officials with the UAW announced plans in November to try to simultaneously organize workers at more than a dozen nonunion auto factories.
The UAW said its effort will cover nearly 150,000 workers at factories largely in the South, where the UAW has had little success in recruiting new members.
Fain urged non-union auto workers to join the UAW to secure better wages and job protections. He said organizing efforts at plants owned by Toyota, Volkswagen and other international companies have been going well in recent weeks.
"In all my years in the industry I've never seen anything like it," Fain said.
He urged workers to launch organizing committees and also announced the company had filed unfair labor practice complaints against Honda, Hyundai and Volkswagen, where, Fain said, management is actively and illegally working to stop unionization
The drive is targeting U.S. plants run by Toyota, Honda, Hyundai, Nissan, Subaru, Mazda, Volkswagen, Mercedes, BMW and Volvo. Also on the union’s list are U.S. factories run by electric vehicle sales leader Tesla, as well as EV startups Rivian and Lucid.
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