The United Auto Workers (UAW) union says it will go on strike at Ford’s Kentucky Truck Plant as early as this week if the automaker fails to sign a contract with local members by Friday, February 23.
According to union officials, the contract is now five months overdue. At issue are stipulations focusing on employee safety and healthcare, such as setting “minimum in-plant nurse staffing levels,” according to a UAW press release.
The plant, based in Louiseville, employs roughly 9,000 UAW members, representing the largest workforce across Ford’s facilities, and manufactures the Expedition and Navigator SUVs and the F-Series Super Duty pickups. Should talks with company executives fail to produce a deal by the deadline, the factory will face its second labor-related shutdown in less than a year, as it was previously targeted in the six-week walkout strike organized by the UAW in 2023.
The UAW’s warning comes shortly after Ford CEO Jim Farley told attendees of the Wolfe Research Global Auto and Auto Tech Conference that the company’s relationship with the union had changed in the wake of last year’s contract negotiations. “It was an extremely difficult moment for the company,” he remarked. Noting that the brand was one of the few manufacturers to keep pickup production in the U.S., Farley observed “We were the first truck plant they shut down.”
In late 2023, Detroit-Three automakers signed historic labor agreements with UAW officials, promising to boost worker compensation, re-institute cost of living adjustments, and improve benefits. In combination with losses from manufacturing disruptions during the strike, the cost of the new contracts amounted to billions of dollars.
The UAW is currently campaigning at several car factories without labor agreements in the U.S., hoping to find new union chapters ahead of the next round of contract negotiations. One of these is Volkswagen’s Tennessee plant, where the organization says it has already received support from a majority of employees.
