By Kalea Hall
DETROIT, Oct 9 (Reuters) – United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain declared victory on Friday in a race to maintain his position as head of the 400,000-member union.
Fain, 57, who rose to national prominence during a 2023 strike against General Motors, Ford and Chrysler-parent Stellantis, received a majority of the votes and easily topped five challengers, according to preliminary ballot totals released by a federal monitor overseeing the vote.
Fain had widely been expected to win the balloting, which the Detroit Three automakers were watching closely as they look ahead to 2028 contract negotiations. The companies are wary of raising their labor costs at a time when the auto industry is grappling with weaker vehicle demand and intensifying competition.
“One thing I know about our membership is they’re ready to fight,” Fain said in an interview with Reuters. “They know they deserve better. And let’s not fool ourselves. All these companies are massively profitable.”
Fain has pointed to the next round of negotiations as an opportunity to secure gains beyond the union’s landmark 2023 contract, which delivered wage increases of more than 25% over the four-year life of the agreement. The UAW is already urging members to strike in the spring of 2028, when current contracts with the Detroit automakers expire.
GM, Ford and Stellantis did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Fain’s declared victory late Friday.
FAIN’S COMBATIVE APPROACH LED TO GAINS
In 2023, just months after narrowly winning his seat, Fain took an unorthodox, combative stance against the automakers.
He insisted on bargaining with all three automakers at once, a departure from past practice, in which the union got an agreement at one company to use as a template for the other two. Eventually, he launched simultaneous strikes at factories across all three automakers, a first for the union.
“Shawn Fain will continue to take an aggressive approach to collective bargaining. The challenge this time will be that the companies will be well aware” of that approach, said Stephen Silvia, a labor expert from American University.
DETROIT AUTOMAKERS LEERY OF LABOR-COST INCREASES
Fain said on Friday that in 2028 he plans to push to restore pensions for all workers, a benefit that ended for new hires in 2007, around the time of the near-collapse of domestic US auto companies.
GM, Ford and Stellantis, meanwhile, have been stung by tariff expenses, higher raw-materials costs and an expensive rollback of their electric-vehicle plans amid weak US demand. Executives are likely to push back against any meaningful labor-cost increases, said Marick Masters, business professor emeritus at Detroit’s Wayne State University.
“The recipe is there for a major confrontation with the companies being in a less favorable position to withstand the pressures,” he said.
(Reporting by Kalea Hall; additional reporting by Nora Eckert; Editing by Mike Colias)
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