By: Wes McEnany
Edited by: Andrew Bongiovanni
Graphic by: Arsh Naseer
On July 27th, 2022, Vail Kohnert-Young stood up at the 38th United Auto Workers (UAW) Convention and nominated Shawn Fain for President of the UAW. Vail hadn’t planned to be the nominator, but the assigned delegate got cold feet in the tension-filled room. Vail came into the union as a Harvard Law student who helped unionize graduate student workers at the storied Ivy League institution with UAW, an industrial-based union that in recent years has seen militant graduate students join in droves.1 Unhappy with decades of decline, could this once powerful union regain the fighting spirit and channel their legacy, which includes the Flint Sit Down strike in 1938 and having unionized some of the largest firms in the world?
As the pivotal 2024 election approaches amidst widespread fears of continued assaults on democratic norms and institutions, policymakers must recognize the vital role labor unions play in protecting and strengthening democracy.2 The recent successes of the UAW in adopting a “one member, one vote” system and organizing breakthrough victories and losses in union-resistant Southern states illustrate how a revitalized labor movement can serve as a bulwark against creeping authoritarianism. Realizing unions’ full potential as guardians of democracy requires swift passage of the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act to reverse decades of corporate-backed attacks on workers’ collective bargaining rights.3 With democracy itself on the ballot in 2024, empowering unions must be part of a comprehensive strategy to expand and energize citizen participation in the governance of both workplaces and politics.
The UAW’s Democratic Renewal
The UAW’s recent internal reforms and external organizing victories demonstrate the resilience and promise of unions as uniquely democratic institutions. In a historic shift, UAW members voted in 2022 to adopt a “one member, one vote” system for electing top union officers, replacing the antiquated and undemocratic delegate model.4 This change, which followed a federal investigation into corruption by former UAW leaders, represented a major step forward in union democracy and accountability to rank-and-file members. By aligning union governance more closely with the principle of “one person, one vote” that underpins the concept of democracy, the UAW enhanced its legitimacy as a vehicle for the rising militancy and collective voice of workers.
The UAW’s commitment to internal democracy has been matched by external success in organizing new members, particularly in the historically anti-union South. In April of this year, workers at a Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee voted to join the UAW, the first instance of a foreign automaker’s U.S. factory being unionized.5 After running and losing twice in previous union elections, the workers finally won.6 It is not a coincidence that this victory occurred six months after the historic, successful Stand Up Strike at the Big 3 American automakers caught international headlines, enticed President Biden to be the first sitting President to ever walk a picket line, and most importantly, won massive contractual gains after decades of concessionary contracts.
Again this year, the UAW secured a similarly strong contract for workers at Daimler Truck facilities in North Carolina.7 These victories, achieved despite aggressive corporate and Republican political opposition, and punitive state “right-to-work” laws amid a general climate of hostility to organized labor, underscore unions’ enduring appeal as a channel for collective action.
The UAW’s progress on democratization and Southern organizing bodes well for the larger project of strengthening unions as a countervailing force against concentrated corporate power and a training ground for democratic citizenship.8 When unions are invigorated through rank-and-file agency and enabled to grow their membership and influence, they can more effectively advocate for policies that benefit working families, hold corporations, and their private equity and hedge fund handlers accountable, and promote a culture of participation and solidarity. The revival of a democratic, growing UAW shows that even in the face of daunting legal and political challenges, unions remain a potent tool for restoring faith in collective action and transposing democratic practices from the workplace to the public sphere.9
Unions Under Attack, Democracy Follows
The UAW’s hard-won gains, and other flashpoint victories for workers at companies like Starbucks, are an exception to the broader trend of union decline and disempowerment over recent decades. Corporate interests and their political allies have waged a relentless campaign to weaken unions through anti-labor policies such as so-called “right-to-work” laws now on the books in a majority of states.10 By allowing workers to opt out of paying fees to unions while still enjoying the benefits of collective bargaining, these laws aim to starve unions of resources and members.11 The long-term impacts have been devastating: “right-to-work” states have lower union density, depressed wages, reduced benefits, and more dangerous workplaces.
UAW’s recent loss at a Mercedes-Benz in Vance, AL serves as a stark reminder how difficult it is for workers to join unions. Numerous Unfair Labor Practices were filed by the union alleging captive audience meetings, where workers were coerced to listen to union busting consultants and management, and even termination of worker union leaders. In this environment where following the law is merely a suggestion, companies can and do break it with impunity to resist their workers attempts to unionize. This is bad news for workers everywhere, but it’s especially bad news for democracy and mirrors the threats and declines of democracy in this country. If workers aren’t free to voice their opinions and associate in organization at work, how can we expect that to be true in our broader civic society and political institutions?
Beyond the obvious economic harm to working families, the larger cost of anti-union attacks has been a debilitated labor movement less capable of sustaining a healthy democracy. Ample research shows the strong correlation between union strength and pro-democracy outcomes like higher voter turnout12, a more robust social welfare state13, and passage of policies that reduce inequality.14 The decades-long erosion of collective bargaining nationally has exacerbated economic disparities15, diminished workers’ civic engagement, and created a pronounced power imbalance between corporations and employees in the political system. Failure to build robust unions in the South has seen those states remain the most unequal, poor, stifled with structural racism, and symbiotically the least democratic. In the post-war period this led CIO Vice President, Alan Haywood to famously remark, “We must organize the South. We must oust the reactionary Southern Democrats and Northern reactionaries who are in our Congress.”16
Think reactionary political forces aren’t taking note? Think again, Republican Governor Kay Ivey penned an op-ed for the Alabama Chamber of Commerce where she said, “Make no mistake about it: These are out-of-state special interest groups, and their special interests do not include Alabama or the men and women earning a career in Alabama’s automotive industry.”17 The crisis of unions and “threat to democracy”18 has only deepened since the election of Donald Trump and the spread of his authoritarian movement within the Republican Party.19 While Trump’s populist appeals to blue-collar workers helped him flip key Midwestern states in 2016, his administration consistently sided with corporate interests over workers, from appointing a pro-business majority on the National Labor Relations Board to issuing executive orders undermining union rights for federal employees.20
Even more troubling was Trump’s shameless effort to overturn his 2020 electoral defeat by pressuring state officials, filing baseless lawsuits, and finally inciting a violent attack on the Capitol.21 Although the attempted insurrection failed, Trump’s “Big Lie”22 of a stolen election has taken root among much of the Republican base, spawning new waves of voter suppression bills, sham “audits” of certified results, and election deniers running for key offices that control voting.
As the 2024 election approaches, democrats are justifiably alarmed that the “Big Lie” and its proponents could succeed in subverting a future election.23 A Trump comeback or the installation of another right-wing demagogue would likely deal further blows to unions, voting rights, and the democratic rule of law. The countermobilization by unions, both to get out the vote and safeguard democracy over the long haul, has taken on existential urgency. Encouragingly, unions are already serving as a grassroots bulwark against authoritarianism, from helping to elect pro-worker, pro-democracy candidates in the 2022 midterms to organizing for racial justice and police accountability. But for labor to reach its full potential as a democratic counterweight, it needs a major assist from the federal government, much as it got during the New Deal period of the 1930s with passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act and National Labor Relations Board leading to rise of labor standards and dramatic unionization in the prevailing decades.
The PRO Act: Labor Law Reform to Save Democracy
The single most important policy change to strengthen unions and democracy would be passage of the PRO Act. This landmark legislation would remove many of the structural disadvantages that have hobbled union organizing for decades, from overturning state “right-to-work” laws, to prohibiting employer interference in union elections, to establishing monetary penalties for companies that break the law. By restoring workers’ freedom to form unions and negotiate for better conditions, the PRO Act would help grow union density, especially in regions like the South where labor has struggled to gain a foothold and where the authoritarian far-right is rapidly ascending.
Higher union density would, in turn, fortify democracy against the gathering forces of authoritarianism. As the research cited earlier demonstrates, unions boost voter turnout and other forms of civic participation both among their own members and in the wider communities where they have influence. The PRO Act would enable unions to organize more diverse sectors of the workforce, such as gig workers and incarcerated workers in prison labor programs, expanding labor’s reach to marginalized communities that have faced voter suppression. A rejuvenated labor movement would train more workers of all backgrounds in crucial democratic skills like running for office, making collective decisions, and engaging directly with, and debating, issues.
Most crucially, the PRO Act would give unions the necessary influence to go toe-to-toe with corporations and private equity firms to advocate for a robust pro-democracy agenda. With greater resources and a growing membership, unions could mount more effective campaigns for policies that simultaneously boost workers’ rights and voting rights, from raising the minimum wage, to enacting automatic voter registration, to protecting mail-in voting. Unions could also serve as heavily resourced organizational linchpins for intersectional progressive coalitions that weave together economic justice with demands for racial equity, immigrant rights, climate action, and political reform. Such coalitions, with unions playing a key role, have already achieved important state-level victories like restoring voting rights to formerly incarcerated people in Florida,24 and passing paid family medical leave in Colorado.25
The PRO Act would unshackle unions to realize their potential as a democratizing force at a dangerous historical moment.26 While democracy defenders must continue pushing for direct electoral reforms to counter voter suppression, disinformation, and election subversion, they also need strong unions as allies in this generational struggle. Unions are uniquely positioned to organize the multiracial working class,27 connect bread-and-butter economic issues to democratic values, and mobilize members for sustained political engagement beyond a single election cycle. Empowering unions is critical to cultivate the grassroots democratic muscle needed to protect free and fair elections in 2024 and beyond.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. captured this confluence between labor rights and voting rights when he told striking sanitation workers in Memphis, just days before his assassination, “Let it be known everywhere that along with wages and all of the other securities that you are struggling for, you are also struggling for the right to organize and be recognized.”28 In 2024 and the years ahead, the labor and democratic rights of working people will again rise or fall together. By eliminating the steep barriers workers face in organizing unions, we can create the conditions to win. Passing the PRO Act is urgent, necessitating decisive action.
Works Cited
[1] Eric D. Lawrence, “UAW Delegates, in Departure from Past, Make Nominations for Top Offices,” Detroit Free Press, July 28, 2022, https://www.freep.com/story/money/cars/2022/07/28/uaw-2022-convention-nominations/10157617002/.
[2] Monica Potts, “Americans think democracy is in peril in the 2024 election,” ABC News, February 24, 2024, https://abcnews.go.com/538/americans-democracy-peril-2024-election/story?id=106803471.
[3] Sarah Jones, “The PRO Act Could Do More Than Revive Unions,” New York Magazine, March 13, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/03/what-is-the-pro-act.html.
[4] Noam Scheiber, “From Detroit to Hollywood, New Union Leaders Take a Harder Line,” The New York Times, August 16, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/16/business/economy/union-leaders-teamsters-uaw-hollywood.html
[5] Tom Krisher and Kristin M. Hall. 2024. “Tennessee Volkswagen Employees Overwhelmingly Vote to Join United Auto Workers Union.” AP News. https://apnews.com/article/volkswagen-union-vote-united-auto-workers-chattanooga-51544590d8a06efddfa2f6ac7db00fbe.
[6] Ibid.
[7] Andrea Hsu. 2024. “UAW Strike at Daimler Truck Averted at 11th Hour.” NPR. https://www.npr.org/2024/04/26/1247632662/daimler-truck-uaw-strike-averted.
[8] Benjamin Sachs, “The Unbundled Union: Politics Without Collective Bargaining,” The Yale Law Journal vol. 123, no. 1 (2013): 148-207, https://www.yalelawjournal.org/essay/the-unbundled-union.
[9] John Logan, “The Union Avoidance Industry in the United States,” British Journal of Industrial Relations vol. 44, no. 4 (December 2006): 651-75. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-8543.2006.00518.x.
[10] Andy Stern. 2013. “Unions & Civic Engagement: How the Assault on Labor Endangers Civil Society.” Daedalus 142, no. 2: 119–38. https://doi.org/10.1162/daed_a_00208.
[11] Josh Bivens et al., “How Today’s Unions Help Working People,” Economic Policy Institute, August 24, 2017, https://www.epi.org/publication/how-todays-unions-help-working-people-giving-workers-the-power-to-improve-their-jobs-and-unrig-the-economy/.
[12] Benjamin Radcliff and Patricia Davis, “Labor Organization and Electoral Participation in Industrial Democracies,” American Journal of Political Science vol. 44, no. 1 (January 2000): 132-41, https://www.jstor.org/stable/2669299.
[13] Sarita Gupta, Stephen Lerner, and Joseph A. McCartin, “It’s Not the ‘Future of Work,’ It’s the Future of Workers That’s in Doubt,” American Prospect, August 31, 2018, https://prospect.org/labor/future-work-future-workers-doubt/.
[14] Tova Wang, “Union Impact on Voter Participation—and How to Expand It,” Union Impact on Voter Participation – And How to Expand It, June 2020, https://ash.harvard.edu/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/300871_hvd_ash_union_impact_v2.pdf.
[15] David Madland, “Unions and Democracy,” Center for American Progress Action Fund, June 3, 2021, https://www.americanprogressaction.org/article/unions-democracy/.
[16] Michael Goldfield, The Southern Key: Class, Race, and Radicalism in the 1930s and 1940s (New York: Oxford University Press, 2020), 194.
[17] Words by Gov. Kay Ivey, “Gov. Ivey: I’m Fighting to Protect Alabama’s Auto Jobs amid UAW Push,” Made in Alabama, January 10, 2024, https://www.madeinalabama.com/2024/01/gov-ivey-unions-want-to-target-one-of-alabamas-crown-jewel-industries-but-im-standing-up-for-alabamians-and-protecting-our-jobs/.
[18] Ried J. Epstein. “Biden Condemns Trump as Dire Threat to Democracy in a Blistering Speech.” The New York Times, January 5, 2024. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/05/us/politics/biden-speech-trump-jan-6.html.
[19] Alex Newhall, “Democracy in Peril: Biden and the 2024 Presidential Election,” Chicago Policy Review, May 28, 2024, https://chicagopolicyreview.org/2024/05/27/democracy-in-peril-biden-and-the-2024-presidential-election/.
[20] Celine McNicholas, Margaret Poydock, and Lynn Rhinehart, “Unprecedented: The Trump NLRB’s Attack on Workers’ Rights,” Economic Policy Institute, October 16, 2019, https://www.epi.org/publication/unprecedented-the-trump-nlrbs-attack-on-workers-rights/.
[21] Jane Mayer, “The Big Money Behind the Big Lie,” The New Yorker, August 2, 2021, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/08/09/the-big-money-behind-the-big-lie.
[22] Doug Bock Clark, Alexandra Berzon, and Kirsten Berg. “Building the ‘Big Lie’: Inside the Creation of Trump’s Stolen Election Myth.” ProPublica, April 26, 2022. https://www.propublica.org/article/big-lie-trump-stolen-election-inside-creation.
[23] Barton Gellman, “Trump’s Next Coup Has Already Begun,” The Atlantic, December 9, 2021, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2022/01/january-6-insurrection-trump-coup-2024-election/620843/.
[24] Florida Rights Restoration Coalition. Accessed June 17, 2024. https://floridarrc.com/.
[25] “About Paid Family and Medical Leave for Colorado.” Colorado Paid Family and Medical Leave Coalition, 2020. https://cofamli.org/about/.
[26] Celine McNicholas, Margaret Poydock, and Lynn Rhinehart, “Unprecedented: The Trump NLRB’s Attack on Workers’ Rights,” Economic Policy Institute, October 16, 2019, https://www.epi.org/publication/unprecedented-the-trump-nlrbs-attack-on-workers-rights/.
[27] Maurice Mitchell, “Organizing the Multiracial Working Class,” Organizing the Multiracial Working Class, February 24, 2021, https://prospect.org/politics/organizing-the-multiracial-working-class/.
[28] Martin Luther King Jr., “Martin Luther King, Jr.: All Labor Has Dignity,” Martin Luther King, Jr.: All Labor Has Dignity, January 19, 2015, https://truthout.org/articles/martin-luther-king-jr-all-labor-has-dignity/.
