Governors warn autoworkers against voting for a union, claim it could put their jobs in jeopardy

A group of six southern governors warned autoworkers in their states that voting to unionize would put their jobs in jeopardy Tuesday, the day before the vote takes place. 

Thousands of autoworkers in Tennessee are expected to vote on Wednesday on whether they want to be represented by the United Auto Workers union, which led major strikes against automakers in Detroit last year. 

UAW President Shawn Fain claimed at the time that the union would target more than a dozen nonunion auto plants, which affects more than 150,000 workers in the south, according to the Associated Press.

The effort to discourage the unionization is led by Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, a Republican, and has been supported by Republican governors in Texas, Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Georgia.

“We are seeing the fallout of the Detroit Three strike with those automakers rethinking investments and cutting jobs,” the governors said in a statement. “Putting businesses in our states in that position is the last thing we want to do.”

The UAW’s agreements with Detroit automakers last year gave autoworkers a 25% raise in pay by April of 2028, which means top assembly workers will make as much as $42 an hour, which amounts to just over $87,000 a year. 

Wednesday’s vote will take place at a Volkswagen factory, where at least 4,300 workers are expected to participate in the vote. The vote tabulations are expected to be completed by the National Labor Relations Board on Friday night. 

Volkswagen said workers at the Tennessee plant already make up to $60,000 a year, which it claims is above the median household in the area. However, it also said it would respect the workers’s right to vote.

“We will fully support an NLRB vote so every team member has a chance to vote in privacy in this important decision,” the automaker said.

Non-unionized workers at an auto plant in Alabama have also filed paperwork to hold a vote on whether they want to be represented by UAW, but no date for that election has been set.