Will unions sweep the American South?
The UAW won big at Volkswagen in Tennessee, but organising at other car plants is harder

Last July car parts as heavy as a small horse fell on Renee Berry. Three surgeries later she has metal rods, bolts and screws up her arms and cannot lift her two-year-old grandchild. In her 14 years working on the assembly line at the Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, she found the factory floor to be disorganised and unsafe. Eventually she joined a union drive to persuade her colleagues to take action. When workers voted in late April to make Volkswagen the first foreign carmaker in the South to unionise, Ms Berry fell to the floor in joy, raised her hands and called out: “Thank you, Lord, you heard our cry.”
Explore more
This article appeared in the United States section of the print edition under the headline “Will unions sweep the South?”
United States May 11th 2024
- America’s federal district courts may soon be harder to manipulate
- Plenty of circumstantial evidence at Donald Trump’s trial
- American pupils have missed too much school since the pandemic
- How Kristi Noem missed her shot to be vice-president
- Why online marketplaces have not killed the estate sale
- Will unions sweep the American South?
- Why the Republicans will convene in a forge of American socialism
Discover more

Why Larry Hogan’s long-odds bid for a Senate seat matters
He offers conservatives a pragmatic path beyond Trumpism

Polarisation by education is remaking American politics
The battle for Pennsylvania is a test case for new coalitions of Democrats and Republicans

Checks and Balance newsletter: Partisan positions have changed drastically over the past 50 years
Kamala Harris and Donald Trump converge as much as they differ
Hurricane Milton inundates Florida
Three factors laid the ground for its destructiveness
Shirley Chisholm is still winning
The first black woman to run for president taught a lesson in making political change
US election forecast: who will control the House of Representatives?
Our prediction model assesses each party’s chance of winning the chamber