United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain is under investigation for alleged retaliation against other union officials, according to court documents filed Monday.Reuters report.
The union’s general secretary, Margaret Mock, has reportedly been stripped of her duties for allegedly “misconducting” the union.[ing] But Mock argued the accusations were false and that Fain had retaliated against him because he was unwilling to approve “certain expenditures” from Fain’s office, the filing showed.
“Sometimes you have to rock the boat.”
Fain also accused Rich Boyer, head of the union’s Stellantis division, of “dereliction of duty” regarding collective bargaining issues. Fain was again accused of retaliating against Boyer for removing him from his job, according to court documents.
Independent federal monitor Neal Barofsky has opened an investigation into the allegations against Fain, Mock and Boyer.
Barofsky argued that Fain and other union officials obstructed the ongoing investigation with a “failure to cooperate” because the UAW did not timely submit requested documents. According to court documents, the union has submitted 2,600 of an estimated 116,000 relevant documents.
Fain told monitors to “investigate any allegations that are brought to their offices because we know what they will find. The UAW leadership is committed to serving our members and running a democratic union.”
“Sometimes you have to rock the boat to move the union in a new direction, and that resents some people who want to maintain the status quo,” Fain said.
The Justice Department argued that the union was making it “difficult, if not impossible, for the watchdog to carry out its mission of rooting out fraud, corruption and illegal activity within the UAW.”
Barofsky was appointed federal monitor in 2021 after a Justice Department investigation led to the convictions of several former union leaders on corruption charges.
Reuters reported that the UAW declined to comment.
Earlier this year, the U.A.W.Supporting President Joe Biden The union also supported the government’s“Strongest ever” automobile emissions standards And he rejected claims that the restrictions would cut union jobs.
“We reject the fear-mongering that tackling the climate crisis must come at the expense of union jobs. Ambitious, achievable regulations can support both. We call on the Biden Administration to hold automakers accountable to ensure that this rule is not used as an excuse to cut jobs or offshoring,” the UAW said in March.
Despite the union’s claims, Stellantis announced last year that it planned to cut jobs, in part because it “needs to control the sales of the vehicles it produces in order to comply with California’s emissions standards, which are measured on a state-by-state basis.”
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