April 5 (UPI) -- The United Auto Workers said on Friday that a super majority of workers at the Mercedes-Benz plant in Alabama have signed union cards and filed a petition to vote on whether to be represented.
A union at one of the South's biggest auto plants, with some 6,000 employees, could shake up the so-called right-to-work state and others like it as the UAW continues to push to increase membership.
If the Tuscaloosa County Mercedes-Benz workers move toward a vote, it would be the second in the South recently. In Chattanooga, Tenn., workers at a Volkswagen plant have slated a vote in two weeks to become UAW represented.
The UAW said it will now apply to the National Labor Relations Board for a union vote at the plant. It said it hopes to have an election as early as May.
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"We are standing up for every worker in Alabama," said Jeremy Kimbrell, a measurement operator at Mercedes in a statement released by the UAW.
"At Mercedes, at Hyundai and hundreds of other companies, Alabama workers have made billions of dollars for executives and shareholders, but we haven't gotten our fair share. We're going to turn things around with this vote. We're going to end the Alabama discount."
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey, though, has spoken out against the unionizing effort, suggesting it is a political move by President Joe Biden and the UAW, which back Democrats. She said Mercedes-Benz has benefitted Alabama families without a union since 1993.
"Let me be crystal clear that Joe Biden's UAW has no interest in seeing Alabama succeed," Ivey said, according to AL.com. "Instead, their interest here is ensuring money from hardworking Alabama families end up in the UAW bank account."
