'Threaten our jobs and values': Southern politicians ramp up campaign against UAW organizing

Her state is expected to host a second UAW plant vote at the Mercedes factory near Tuscaloosa in the coming weeks.

“Since Mercedes Benz announced they were making our state home to their first U.S. manufacturing facility in 1993, tens of thousands of Alabama families have been positively impacted," Ivey said in a statement to The News. "Let me be crystal clear that Joe Biden’s UAW has no interest in seeing Alabamians succeed. Instead, their interest here is ensuring money from hardworking Alabama families ends up in the UAW bank account. That is why they are willing to spend $40 million to gain a foothold in the Southeast’s automotive powerhouse.”

Alabama state Rep. Andy Whitt, a Republican who leads the House Economic Development and Tourism Committee, said the state's "booming" economy is largely thanks to its auto industry, so there's no reason to introduce a new dynamic.

"The old southern saying 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it' comes to mind whenever the subject of union expansion is raised," Whitt said in an email to The News.

He said Alabama lawmakers passed the state's right-to-work law in 1953 after seeing some "disturbing" trends of nonunion workers at certain plants being intimidated or forced out by union members wanting a closed shop. In 2016, he added, voters overwhelmingly enshrined those right-to-work provisions in the state constitution.

Other southern politicians have raised concerns about corruption. In a recent column, Alabama state Rep. Scott Stadthagen, the Republican majority leader, mentioned the UAW's embezzlement scandal several years ago that sent multiple leaders to prison, then went a step further by arguing that the UAW and other unions are "multi-level marketing scams" designed to grow membership, but "only a few at the top get rich." Stadthagen didn't respond to requests for an interview.

Among the most common refrains among opponents, though, is that more UAW-represented plants in the South will hamper those states' economic development efforts and job creation. "(T)he prospect of unionization may deter companies from expanding or establishing operations in the state, fearing the added costs and complexities associated with union representation," Ryan Egly, the leader of the Lawrence County Chamber of Commerce in Tennessee, recently wrote of the UAW's expansion effort.

Dennis Cuneo, a site selection expert and former Toyota executive who has worked on a number of projects in the South, said there's something to that argument.

"The nonunion states, one of the first things they emphasize (to companies) is right-to-work, you don't have to worry about unionization down here," Cuneo said. "So if that paradigm changes, yes, it does change their ability to use that to attract businesses."

For some companies considering locating a new plant, a right-to-work law and low union rate is their top priority, he said, because they want to avoid having the added layer of bureaucracy of the union.

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