UAW Direct Election Referendum Ends
The union’s International Executive Board has always been elected using a delegate system. That system, critics say, led to the corruption that resulted in more than a dozen convictions of union officials and auto company executives.
The UAW’s international referendum on direct elections ends today.
Ballots were mailed to members of the United Auto Workers in October giving them the option to change the way their leaders are elected. The union’s International Executive Board has always been elected using a delegate system. That system, critics say, led to the corruption that resulted in more than a dozen convictions of union officials and auto company executives.
The UAW’s agreement with the government required members be given the chance to choose to elect leadership directly — giving each member a vote for each officer.
As of Nov. 24, the federally appointed monitor reports a little more than 138,000 ballots had been received from the union’s almost a million members.
Earlier reports of a larger number of returned votes was incorrect. The U.S. Postal Service, the monitor reports, incorrectly combined a number of returned and completed ballots with blank ballots returned through the postal system because they could not be delivered to members in the first place.
All ballots must received by the monitor today to be counted.
Unite All Workers for Democracy, or UAWD, is a caucus within the UAW that has been campaigning in support of direct elections. UAWD has members observing the vote count in Hamden, Connecticut, and will post unofficial results online here Monday afternoon.
The official vote tally will be certified and released by the federal monitor.
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