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Democrats in the U.S. House on Wednesday opened an "inquiry" into whether Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam's administration might have violated federal labor law by attempting to tie state incentives for expansion of the Chattanooga Volkswagen plant to the outcome of an election over representation by the United Auto Workers union. The probe is yet another chapter in the ongoing debate over whether Republican officials, including Haslam and U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, may have interfered in the February election in which workers voted 712-626 to reject the UAW, which was attem

The Chattanooga plant’s February secret-ballot vote to remain non-union was seen as a major triumph for the right-to-work community. But Volkswagen has since been under intense pressure from the company’s highly influential German union IG-METAL to figure out how to void the election result.

Three anti-union Volkswagen workers have sued the German automaker and the United Auto Workers in a U.S. court, alleging that VW and the union improperly colluded in the run-up to a union election in Tennessee that the UAW lost. The lawsuit marks the latest fallout from a hard-fought contest at VW's plant in Chattanooga, where workers voted 712-626 last month not to join the UAW. The union is asking federal regulators to scrap that result and hold a new election. Filed on Wednesday in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee, the complaint alleges VW provided "thing of...

When the UAW failed miserably in Chattanooga and was not able to unionize the Volkswagen plant, even with a staked deck, it started a chain reaction and the next domino has fallen. The news that the AFL-CIO has decided to keep its money and not even try to save three Southern Democrat Senators comes as no real shock. The powerful union reviewed the polls and the political climate in North Carolina, Louisiana and Arkansas and decided backing the Democrats in these states would be throwing good money after bad. The decision left Democrat Senators Mark Pryor in Arkansas, Mary Landrieu...

Volkswagen’s first foray into America’s automotive manufacturing industry was, by all accounts, a disaster. Less than six months after the company opened a plant in Pennsylvania in 1978, workers went on strike for higher wages and the company was hit with a series of union-backed lawsuits. The factory lasted just 10 years. It took Volkswagen more than two decades to venture back into the U.S. and, when it did, with a $1-billion assembly plant that opened in 2011, it chose Tennessee, a place where being anti-union is considered as patriotic as apple pie. The Southern U.S. has built itself into...

WASHINGTON/CHATTANOOGA (Reuters) - In the aftermath of the United Auto Workers' crushing defeat in a vote to represent workers at Volkswagen's sole U.S. factory, a key question remains unanswered: did conservative politicians and anti-union groups work together to stymie the union? In an appeal to the National Labor Relations Board on Friday, the UAW said there was a "coordinated effort" by state politicians, anti-union groups and Tennessee's U.S. Senator Bob Corker to coerce a no vote in the February 12-14 election. The union's NLRB filing offered scant detail to support the allegation, and Reuters interviews with more than a dozen...

The United Auto Workers (UAW) filed a legal challenge late Friday with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to the certification of the organizing vote it lost last Friday at Volkswagen's auto plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee. The challenge was submitted just hours before the seven day post-election filing deadline expired. On Tuesday, attorney Joseph Farelli, a nationally recognized labor law expert, told Breitbart News the UAW would have little chance of success if it filed a challenge to NLRB certification of the election. "I don't think the NLRB is willing to break new ground and state the conduct of a...

Volkswagen’s top labor representative threatened on Wednesday to try to block further investments by the German carmaker in the southern United States if its workers there are not unionized. Workers at VW’s factory in Chattanooga, Tennessee, last Friday voted against representation by the United Auto Workers union (UAW), rejecting efforts by VW representatives to set up a German-style works council at the plant. German workers enjoy considerable influence over company decisions under the legally enshrined “co-determination” principle which is anathema to many politicians in the U.S. who see organized labor as a threat to profits and job growth. …

Hydrogen and natural gas are among the alternative fuels starting to get more attention as car companies work to reduce emissions. But Audi is exploring yet another option that you may not have heard much about yet: e-fuels.

Bernd Osterloh, who is the Volkswagen AG General and Group Works Council chairman, said that future investments in the South might be hurt if workers will not unionize, according to Reuters. The comments come days after Volkswagen Chattanooga workers voted against representation by the United Auto Workers Union. After years of quiet work by union leaders and a contentious campaigning period, officials announced Friday night that Volkswagen employees opted against UAW representation with a 712-626 vote. But at that announcement, Volkswagen Chattanooga President Frank Fischer said the vote wasn't against the works council and that there is still support for...

Labor: Union bosses have contended for some time that a secret ballot isn't needed to unionize a workplace. All that's needed, they said, was employees' signatures on cards. But Chattanooga proved them wrong. For months the United Auto Workers have said a majority of workers at the Volkswagen plant in Tennessee had signed cards expressing their interest in unionizing. Why bother with a secret ballot when the workers had already spoken through the "card check" approval process? Before a much-anticipated and widely followed union-representation vote held last week, the AP reported that Gary Casteel, Tennessee-based regional director for the UAW,...

Mark down Feb. 14, 2014, as the Saint Valentine's Day union massacre. Years from now we may look back at this date as the turning point of the modern-day union dominance over manufacturing industries in America. That's the broader national significance of the 712-to-626 vote in Chattanooga, Tenn., to reject a United Auto Workers attempt to unionize a Volkswagen auto assembly plant. Despite a full-court blitz by the AFL-CIO and even the Volkswagen management to allow the union in, the workers turned thumbs-down to the power play. Why? Three weeks ago I traveled to Chattanooga on behalf of the Beacon...

Workers at Volkswagen’s sedan factory in Chattanooga, Tenn., soundly rejected a bid by the United Automobile Workers (UAW) to subsume them. In this the workers were considerably wiser than VW management, which took an officially neutral stance on the unionization effort but is in general kindly disposed to efforts to transplant the “workers’ council” model, with which it has enjoyed success at home, from Germany to its American operations. German automakers maintain a largely cooperative relationship with IG Metall, the main autoworkers’ union. But the UAW is a very different sort of beast, a fact not lost on the Chattanooga...

In a huge defeat for the United Auto Workers (UAW) union, workers in Tennessee voted 712 to 626 against union representation at a Volkswagen plant. This event may be remembered in the future as one of the final nails in the union coffin. We can only hope so but this news is fantastic, and even better as the UAW had a lot of advantages going into the vote. First, Volkswagen was in favor of unionization and had already been conducting talks with the UAW. Normally, businesses are hostile to unions as they are a cancerous parasite that will slowly sap...

You won’t hear much about this week’s defeat for the United Auto Workers. The thugs were trying to unionize Volkswagen’s Chattanooga plant workers. This was no ordinary defeat. It is best described as a death knell for the UAW’s efforts to unionize the South and forcibly use the increase in union dues to finance further destruction of America by their pals in the Democrat Party. That’s over now. There were a few important reasons for the kick in the teeth the union took, but one you certainly won’t hear mentioned is that “Jonah” Obama who brings defeat to Democrats wherever...

In a close vote, yet one that was widely expected to be favorable to the union, workers at the Tennessee Volkswagen plant rejected an offer by the United Auto Workers to unionize the Volkswagen operations in the state by a 712-626 vote against union. “Last week's vote at the plant - which was 53 percent to 47 percent against the UAW,” writes Reuters, “dealt a body blow to the union, which has been unable to expand into auto plants in the U.S. South, even as its ranks have declined elsewhere.” The election is seen as a major rebuff in the...

“The United Auto Workers union suffered a crushing defeat Friday, falling short in an election in which it seemed to have a clear path to organizing workers at Volkswagen’s plant in Chattanooga, Tenn.,” the [1] Wall Street Journal [1] reported Saturday. “The setback is a bitter defeat because the union had the cooperation of Volkswagen management and the aid of Germany’s powerful IG Metall union, yet it failed to win a majority among the plants 1,550 hourly workers.”One cannot emphasize the magnitude of this loss. What it clearly spells out is the irrelevance of the old industrial unions in today’s...

The three Associated Press reports I've seen on the UAW's failure to win the right to represent hourly workers at the Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee — the first two were covered in NewsBusters posts here and here; the wire service's 3:52 p.m. report is here — all mention in one way or another what UAW President Bob King is now calling "unprecedented outside interference" in the runup to the election. (VW, which can only run the factory with the kind of "workers councils" it has at its other worldwide plants in the U.S. if its workers are represented by...

A key victory for the UAW is on the line. Friday is the last day of a union-organizing vote at a Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, Tenn. At stake is whether the German automaker's sole plant in the U.S. will be represented by the United Auto Workers. But it's also much more than that: The battle being waged in Chattanooga is being billed as a seminal moment that will either pave the way for more labor unions in the South, or affirm the continuation of a "right to work" region that is UAW-free. Going into the three-day election, the vote was...

CHATTANOOGA, Tennessee (Reuters) - In a stinging defeat that could accelerate the decades-long decline of the United Auto Workers, Volkswagen AG workers voted against union representation at a Chattanooga, Tennessee plant, which had been seen as organized labor's best chance to expand in the U.S. South. The loss, 712 to 626, capped a sprint finish to a long race and was particularly surprising for UAW supporters, because Volkswagen had allowed the union access to the factory and officially stayed neutral on the vote, while other manufacturers have been hostile to organized labor.