GM battery joint venture agrees to recognize UAW at Tennessee plant

The United Auto Workers said on Wednesday that a battery manufacturing joint venture between General Motors and LG Energy Solution has agreed to recognize the union at a Tennessee plant.

The UAW said a majority of the employees at the Ultium Cells facility signed cards to join the UAW and the company had agreed to recognize the union after workers at an Ohio Ultium plant overwhelmingly voted to join the union in 2022 and won a new contract earlier this year with significant wage hikes.

The Tennessee factory employs 1,000 workers and produces batteries for GM’s electric vehicles built in a nearby assembly plant, including the Cadillac Lyriq.

“The team at Ultium Cells in Tennessee has indicated their desire to be represented by the UAW. The parties will now move into the local bargaining process,” a GM spokesman said.

A spokesperson for Ultium Cells confirmed it has recognized the UAW at the Spring Hill facility. Representatives for LG did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

GM’s battery operations were a point of contention in last year’s UAW contract negotiations, during which the union held strikes at plants across the Big Three automakers for six weeks.

The automaker eventually agreed to let its Ultium battery plants come under the union’s master agreement once a majority of workers decide to unionize.

UAW President Shawn Fain is leading a $40 million nationwide organizing effort, targeting large automakers such as Toyota and Tesla.

The union notched a win at Volkswagen in April when 73% of voting workers at a plant in Tennessee opted to join the UAW’s ranks, making it the first auto plant in the South to unionize via an election since the 1940s.

Workers at a Mercedes-Benz plant in Alabama weeks after the win voted against joining the union. The UAW said earlier this year that more than 30% of employees at a Hyundai plant in Alabama and at a Missouri Toyota auto parts factory have signed cards indicating they want to join the UAW.

The union’s executive board recently endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris in her bid for president, emphasizing that the Democrat stands with workers more than Republican former President Donald Trump. Fain and Trump have exchanged barbs over the last few months, with Fain calling the former president a “scab” and Trump calling for Fain to be fired.

Having the backing of the next administration could provide support for the union’s ongoing organizing efforts, but it will likely not make or break them, labor professors have said.

(Reporting by Nora Eckert and David Shepardson; Editing by Philippa Fletcher and Mark Porter)