Business
Column: The UAW sends a lightning bolt into anti-union states with a huge victory at a VW plant
Until Friday, the phrase “union victory at Chattanooga” could mean only one thing: the defeat of a Confederate army by forces under U.S. Grant at the Battle of Chattanooga in late November 1863.
No longer. On Friday, the United Auto Workers scored a decisive victory at a Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, Tenn., as workers voted overwhelmingly to organize with the UAW.
The vote looks like a milestone. It was the UAW’s first victory at an auto plant in the Deep South, following two defeats — in 2014 and 2019 — at the same plant. It comes on the heels of the UAW’s success in negotiating impressive new contracts with the Big Three domestic automakers in October.
The real importance of this election is not just the organizing of this factory. It’s that it announces the South is open to unions.
— Labor historian Erik Loomis
The vote opens the door to further votes and organizing drives across the region, where political leaders have kept unions weak in part through anti-union right-to-work laws — all 14 Deep South states, as well as 12 others, have those laws. Next on the schedule is a vote by 5,000 workers at a Mercedes plant in Alabama, scheduled to take place May 13-17.
“The real importance of this election is not just the organizing of this factory,” says labor historian Erik Loomis. “It’s that it announces the South is open to unions…. This has been the greatest struggle for the American labor movement for more than a century. A serious breakthrough in the South is now possible.”
The vote also represents a strong rebuke to the GOP political establishment in the South. Indeed, it turns the history of regional auto worker organizing on its head. In 2014, it may be remembered, Tennessee’s GOP establishment pulled out the stops to discourage workers at the Chattanooga plant from organizing with the UAW.
VW was willing to accept unionization, with an eye toward replicating the labor-management “works councils” common among manufacturing companies at its home in Germany. (“Volkswagen considers its corporate culture of works councils a competitive advantage,” a member of VW’s board had told the Associated Press.)
In response, then-Gov. Bill Haslam threatened the company with retribution, declaring that Tennessee would withdraw incentives for Volkswagen if the UAW was voted in.
Then-GOP Sen. Bob Corker, a former Chattanooga mayor, flew down from Washington to voice an almost certainly specious claim that VW executives had “assured” him that the company would open a new SUV manufacturing line at the plant — if the workers turned the UAW down. A local VW executive disputed that.
With shocking cynicism, Corker co-opted the language of political resistance to discourage workers from voting in the union, stating that if the UAW won the vote, “it’s going to be something we can overcome — we will overcome.”
I marveled at the time that the ghost of Pete Seeger, who had turned a couple of traditional gospel songs into the civil rights anthem “We Shall Overcome,” didn’t rise from the grave and impale Corker on a lightning bolt.
Corker also perverted another protest slogan into an attack on workers by declaring, “the whole world is watching.”
The 2014 organizing campaign failed on a 626-712 vote. After the UAW filed a protest with the National Labor Relations Board over the interference by Haslam, Corker and their cronies, the 2019 revote was held. It was another defeat for the union, but narrower, with 48% of the votes in favor, compared with 46% in 2014.
This time around, the vote was 2,628 in favor versus 985 against — a 72.7% majority.
Early signs that the Chattanooga workers would vote to unionize didn’t stop GOP politicians from trying to place their thumbs on the scale. In a joint statement issued the day before voting began, Tennessee’s current GOP governor, Bill Lee, and the governors of Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, South Carolina and Texas decried what they hypocritically called “the unionization campaign driven by misinformation and scare tactics that the UAW has brought into our states.”
The governors noted that all three automakers that signed the October contracts with the UAW had announced layoffs since then. That’s true, but it was a lie to ascribe the layoffs to the union contracts: In each case, the companies linked them to an unexpected slowdown in the market for electric vehicles.
What the governors didn’t mention — an inadvertent oversight, you can be sure — several of the non-union foreign automakers with plants in the South, such as Mercedes, Tesla and BMW, all of which are being targeted by the UAW, have also announced layoffs.
Perhaps more to the point, in the wake of the Big Three contract settlements, Toyota, Honda, Nissan and Subaru all announced raises of as much as 11% for their workers — plainly a demonstration that higher pay at unionized companies ripples into the nonunion sector of an industry. All those companies except Subaru have plants in states represented by the governors who issued the statement; Subaru’s only U.S. plant is in Lafayette, Ind.
“In America,” the governors wrote, “we respect our workforce and we do not need to pay a third party to tell us who can pick up a box or flip a switch.” They added, “when employees have a direct relationship with their employers, that makes for a more positive working environment. They can advocate for themselves and what is important to them without outside influence.”
Students of anti-union rhetoric will recognize this spiel as drawn directly from the playbook of intransigently anti-union employers such as Starbucks, including the assertions that union representation is inimical to the smooth operation of a workplace and that unions interfere with the employee-employer relationship.
As almost any experienced worker knows, “direct contact” between the rank-and-file and management almost never works out to the advantage of the workers unless they have the leverage that comes from collective action. The governors’ claim that employees can successfully “advocate for themselves” is virtually pure myth.
The governors also may have failed to read the room, as the saying goes. “The demographics of the South are different than they were 10 years ago,” Loomis told me. “More Latinos and more people moving from the North has been transformational to the South generally — the shift of politics in Georgia due to the expansive growth of Atlanta is one example. Charlotte has become a massive destination for young Black professionals, for another. The South simply isn’t as different from the rest of the nation as it used to be.”
Nor should one overlook the distinct change in labor policies at the federal level. Joe Biden’s stature as possibly the most pro-labor president in American history has been widely noticed. He is the only president to walk a union picket line, as he did during the UAW contract negotiations; he has been sticking with Julie Su, his nominee as secretary of Labor against ferocious opposition from Big Business; and his National Labor Relations Board has fulfilled its role as a guardian of collective bargaining rights.
Whether NLRB oversight of the Chattanooga vote tamped down the company’s efforts to undermine the vote isn’t clear, but it couldn’t have hurt.
The UAW’s success in its contract negotiations may emerge as a powerful argument in favor of organizing at other auto plants. There may be some defeats in the South lurking on the horizon, but there may also be further successes.
It’s worth recalling what happened after Grant’s victory in Chattanooga in 1863. Following the nearly simultaneous Union victories of July 1863 at Vicksburg, Miss., and Gettysburg, Pa., Chattanooga tightened the noose on the Confederacy, opening the door to Sherman’s march to the sea in 1864 and the end of the Confederacy.
Last week’s vote in Chattanooga might, just might, be an equivalent turning point in the long war for worker rights and welfare.
An aging downtown office complex will be converted into apartments as part of an ambitious plan by local real estate companies to create 4,000 affordable housing units in Los Angeles.
The first project will be a $200-million makeover of the L.A. World Trade Center, a sprawling white elephant of an office complex on Figueroa Street built in the 1970s that will be turned into 512 apartments in one of the largest affordable housing conversions to date downtown.
Future projects being planned in the central city for delivery over the next five years will include other office-to-apartment conversions and new housing built from the ground up.
The 10-story World Trade Center, right, at Figueroa and Fourth streets in downtown Los Angeles, was built in the mid-1970s.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
Behind the building campaign unveiled Monday are two of the region’s largest real estate companies, Jamison and Kennedy Wilson. Jamison is the city’s most prolific converter of offices to market-rate apartments and currently has a major makeover of a downtown office skyscraper underway for tenants who can pay top rents.
Kennedy Wilson, a real estate investment company based in Beverly Hills, owns Vintage Housing, which builds and operates affordable housing using tax credits and other state and federal financing to help fund it.
Vintage Housing and Jamison’s new affordable housing division, Arden Residential, will take on the campaign to build the housing where qualified tenants will pay rents below market rates.
Rents in the World Trade Center — which will be renamed Sky Castle when it opens in early 2028 — are expected to start at $937 for a one-bedroom unit. Some two- and three-bedroom units would rent for $1,100 and $1,300 per month, respectively, developers said.
Sky Castle will have shared amenities found in more expensive modern apartments, the developers said, such as a fitness center, resident lounge and co-working space. It already has six tennis courts on the roof, which may be converted to pickleball courts, Jamison Chief Executive Garrett Lee said.
The goal is to build higher quality affordable housing by using efficient construction methods Jamison has learned through building more than 8,000 market-rate apartments in the past, Lee said. The makeover of the World Trade Center will mark Jamison’s 15th conversion of an office building to housing.
The plan to redevelop the L.A. World Trade Center, bottom left, is one of the largest affordable housing conversions to date downtown.
(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)
The 10-story World Trade Center was built in the mid-1970s to fanfare saying it would be home to international companies. In 1976, The Times described the center as a place to prepare for an overseas trip where visitors could get passports and visas, as well as exchange dollars for francs, marks, rubles and other currency. There was a language school and branches of U.S., Swiss and Japanese banks.
By the mid-1980s, the 400,000-square-foot office complex covering a city block at Figueroa and Fourth streets had lost its international flavor and was falling out of favor with corporate tenants who were moving into glossy new skyscrapers on Bunker Hill and in other locations.
The building has been cleared of remaining office tenants to allow work to begin in August, Lee said.
Kennedy Wilson is a nationwide operator of market-rate apartments that has also moved into building affordable housing in the last decade, said Nicholas Bridges, global head of capital markets at the company.
Building affordable, workforce housing “in almost all cases requires public subsidies,” Bridges said, and Kennedy Wilson has developed expertise in assembling “a cocktail of public financing sources” that includes low-income housing tax credits and tax-exempt bonds.
In the past, many housing developers have shied away from building affordable housing because assembling the subsidies needed to make construction profitable is challenging.
An artist’s rendering shows what the L.A. World Trade Center could look like after being redeveloped into affordable housing. The new complex is to be called Sky Castle.
(Ian Camarillo)
“It’s complicated,” Bridges said, “and not for the faint of heart.”
Eligible tenants must earn between 30% and 80% of the median income in the area where the housing is built.
Jamison and Kennedy Wilson will develop about 15 affordable housing projects between downtown and the 405 Freeway, Bridges said, many of them in aging office buildings such as the World Trade Center that are already owned by Jamison and are close to public transit.
Substantial potential for affordable housing lies in L.A.’s underused office buildings, he said.
“In this post-COVID world, the way people are utilizing office buildings, particularly older office buildings, has just fundamentally changed,” he said.
It makes sense for developers of conventional multifamily housing to move to building affordable housing, Lee said, because the government supports it through subsidies, zoning reform and the fast-tracking of construction permits. The city of Los Angeles also recently streamlined its adaptive reuse rules to make it easier to convert office buildings to housing.
“There are a lot of incentives pushing us in this direction,” Lee said.
Comcast is spinning off its NBCUniversal entertainment and news media businesses into a separate publicly traded company, a move that would unwind an audacious play the cable giant made for the storied Hollywood assets 15 years ago.
The plan would put broadcast networks NBC and Telemundo, NBC News, cable network Bravo, streaming service Peacock, the Los Angeles-based Universal film and television studios, Universal theme parks and British TV service Sky in a new stand-alone company.
Philadelphia-based Comcast would remain in its core business of distributing pay-TV channels, broadband internet and wireless services.
The spinoff would be the second such move by Comcast in two years. Late last year, the Brian L. Roberts-controlled company cast off most of its cable portfolio, including CNBC, USA Network, MS NOW and Golf Channel to form a new entity called Versant.
But the maneuver failed to budge Comcast’s listless stock, which has languished for years as its primary business lost thousands of broadband customers.
Comcast executives needed to make a bolder move to mollify frustrated investors.
Comcast stock peaked at nearly $26 per share Monday before closing at $24.22, up roughly 4.5% from Friday. Still, the stock remains below its 52-week high of $34.34.
The plan announced Monday would unravel Comcast’s bold decision to acquire NBCUniversal from General Electric Co. in 2011. At the time, Comcast saw tremendous value in marrying NBC’s entertainment operations, including its then-lucrative cable channels, with its cable TV distribution service that Roberts’ late father, Ralph, launched in Tupelo, Miss., in 1963.
“They were two distinct businesses,” longtime cable analyst Craig Moffett wrote in a Monday note to investors. “Having them under the same roof didn’t make either better.”
Consumers shifted to streaming, and Comcast’s attempt to build a top-tier digital service, Peacock, has fallen well short of its goal. Peacock lags behind rivals despite billions of dollars in investment from Comcast.
The concept of unwinding its NBCUniversal operation began in earnest in the fall, when Comcast joined the bidding for Warner Bros. Discovery. Comcast executives knew they could ill afford to spend billions to buy a rival; Wall Street would have pummeled the company.
So Comcast offered to spin off NBCUniversal and pair it with Warner Bros., turning two original Hollywood studios into a new media colossus.
But 43-year-old billionaire David Ellison prevailed in the bidding, agreeing to pay $111 billion to capture Warner Bros. Discovery. Losing the auction forced Comcast to find a different path forward.
On a call with investors, Roberts said the separation would bolster the two firms as they navigate increasing competitive challenges while technology companies continue to transform entertainment.
“We asked ourselves three basic questions,” Roberts said. “One, can these businesses stand alone and have the heft to stand alone in separate companies? Two, do they have a clear, viable capital allocation path to invest? And three, is now the right time? And the answer we came back with was yes to all counts.”
A free-standing NBCUniversal, home of the “Minions” and “Jurassic Park” franchises, probably would be an acquisition target, as media companies have been consolidating in an effort to get more content and mass distribution for their streaming services. Ellison’s Paramount is on track to close its Warner Bros. purchase, which would combine such media assets as HBO Max, CBS, CNN, Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros. studios.
With its Sky business, NBCUniversal has a toehold in Britain and Europe at a time when Amazon and Netflix are flexing their global distribution muscles.
Comcast would be positioned to combine with another cable and internet provider, such as Connecticut-based Charter, which owns the Spectrum television service. Charter is in the process of buying the smaller Cox cable service, which also has operations in Southern California.
Comcast is expected to complete the spinoff next year and will retain an 19% stake in the new entity.
The timetable could put NBCUniversal up for grabs by 2028 — when the company is set to broadcast the Summer Olympics, which will be held in Los Angeles.
Comcast acquired NBCUniversal in 2011. The industry-reshaping deal combined the largest distributor of TV channels with a provider of top-rated TV channels and a movie studio. But the streaming revolution has decimated the cable television business. Traditional TV viewing has been in a steady decline over the last decade. NBC has relied heavily on NFL broadcasts, and more recently, NBA and Major League Baseball games to remain relevant.
NBCUniversal has invested heavily in its streaming service, Peacock, but has been unable to reach the scale necessary for profitability. Comcast‘s stock price has struggled as a result.
Roberts, chairman and chief executive of Comcast, will continue to be involved in the leadership of Comcast and NBCUniversal, working in partnership with the CEOs of both companies.
Mike Cavanagh will remain as CEO of NBCUniversal, and Comcast’s former chief financial officer, Michael Angelakis, will return to run Comcast after the spinoff.
“Perhaps the best part of today’s welcome announcement … is that Mike Angelakis is coming back,” Moffett, the analyst, wrote. “He will now helm the cable business, [which] is unequivocally good news. With Mike Angelakis’s return, Comcast has come full circle.”
Moffett added that, despite Monday’s announcement, the 2011 combination was not a complete bust.
“The deal to acquire NBCU from GE was financially brilliant,” he said. “It was structured so that Comcast paid for just half of the acquisition and then let NBCU’s own cash flow pay for the rest.”
Over the years, Comcast has raked in billions in profit from its media holdings.
Comcast executives on the analyst call played down the notion that the two companies were being positioned for another deal.
“Absolutely not,” Roberts said. “This is the right move to put each company in the strongest position to create value, fully monetize its assets and aggressively pursue its own organic growth strategies.”
Cavanaugh, who has been running the combined company for three years, sounded more like a buyer than a seller.
“Our plan for NBCUniversal and Sky is to build and invest for growth,” he said. “We have the freedom now to explore adjacent businesses where we have the right to play, and that’s thanks to the stability of our company and management team.”
The spinoff announcement comes a week after Fox Corp. announced its deal to purchase the streaming platform Roku for $22 billion. The deal is aimed at ensuring that Fox has a means to get its portfolio of sports, news and entertainment channels into viewers’ homes as the traditional pay-TV business continues to erode.
Rocket Lab took a big step Monday to better compete with rivals SpaceX and Amazon, announcing an $8-billion acquisition of satellite communications company Iridium.
The Long Beach rocket-and-satellite maker is buying a company that provides critical communications services to pilots, mariners and others, while giving Rocket Lab a foothold in the emerging satellite-based mobile phone market.
“We are going to absorb it, optimize it and scale it into something that is really truly fantastic,” said Rocket Lab Chief Executive Peter Beck in a YouTube presentation of the deal.
Rocket Lab is paying $54 a share for McLean, Va.-based Iridium — $27 in cash and the rest in shares. Deutsche Bank and Wells Fargo are providing $3.6 billion in financing in the deal, which is expected to close next year.
Iridium’s 66 low-Earth-orbit satellites provide voice, data, navigation and other services to remote regions and across the globe to 2.55 million government, defense, aviation, maritime and commercial subscribers.
Iridium reported net income of $114 million in 2025, up 2% from the previous year. Revenue climbed 5% to $872 million.
The market for mobile cellular and other satellite-based communications is growing rapidly.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX spent $17 billion last year to acquire spectrum from EchoStar and then followed it up with a $2.6-billion purchase. The spectrum will allow its Starlink broadband satellite network to provide mobile phone service worldwide.
In April, Amazon agreed to acquire satellite operator Globalstar in a roughly $11.6-billion deal that would expand the services of its satellite system and the so-called direct-to-device smartphone market.
The competition has raised concerns about Iridium’s ability to compete.
SpaceX went public this month in the largest initial public offering ever, raising $86 billion, with the company now valued at more than $2 trillion.
In February, Iridium Chief Executive Matthew Desch said the company has shown it’s not “in decline,” dismissing concerns that it couldn’t compete with Starlink, according to Morningstar.
Founded in 2006 in New Zealand, Rocket Lab moved to the U.S. a decade ago and opened its Long Beach headquarters in 2020. It has manufacturing and mission operations in Virginia, New Mexico, Colorado, Maryland, Toronto and New Zealand.
The company manufactures a small rocket called Electron that has launched 262 satellites into space, making it the second-busiest U.S. launch provider behind SpaceX. Rocket Lab is developing a larger rocket called Neutron, and it also makes satellites, subsystems and space components.
Beck said the acquisition of Iridium will propel Rocket Lab into the satellite communications business. That would otherwise be a slow process, requiring the acquisition of spectrum, satellite development and establishment of a customer base.
“We think we’ve found a little bit of a shortcut here,” Beck said, noting the combined company will be vertically integrated, able to design, build, launch and operate its own satellites.
The deal is “very strategic” for Rocket Lab, William Blair analyst Louie DiPalma said in a note to clients, according to Morningstar.
Rocket Lab has announced multiple contracts this year.
Last week, the company said it would launch Electron rockets for three NASA missions from its New Zealand site.
In May, Rocket Lab announced a $30-million contract with Costa Mesa defense contractor Anduril for multiple hypersonic test flights in Virginia using Rocket Lab’s HASTE launch vehicle.
The company is among scores of businesses that have revitalized Southern California’s aerospace and defense industries since SpaceX was founded in 2002. SpaceX, now headquartered in Texas maintains operations in Hawthorne.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth visited Rocket Lab’s headquarters in January during a stop on his tour of defense contractors in Southern California and across the country.
“This company, you right here, are front and center, as part of ensuring that we build an arsenal of freedom that America needs,” Hegseth told several hundred cheering workers. “The future of the battlefield starts right here with dominance of space.”
Iridium investors cheered the news. Its shares gained 25% to close Monday at $54.59. Rocket Lab shares jumped 16% to close at $97.95.
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