Penske Truck Rental employees in Nashville successfully voted to remove the International Association of Machinists (IAM) union from power, the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation announced Thursday.
Nashville workers voted 15-8 on May 8 to decertify the union. The vote was finalized on Thursday.
Last month, as previously reported by The Tennessee Star, Penske employee David Saylor filed a petition with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to decertify the IAM union from power after collecting signatures from a majority of his coworkers.
“Employees may file a petition for decertification (RD) if they believe support for a union has diminished, after collecting signatures from at least 30% of workers in a unit. A majority of votes decides the outcome,” the NLRB says on its website.
Saylor filed the petition at the NLRB with free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, which works to eliminate “coercive union power and compulsory unionism abuses through strategic litigation, public information, and education programs.”
“Workers across the country are increasingly exercising their rights to remove unwanted unions, with more decertification elections held last year than in any year since 2017,” National Right to Work Foundation President Mark Mix said in a statement.
“No worker anywhere should be forced under the so-called ‘representation’ of a union they oppose, and Foundation staff attorneys stand ready to assist workers wanting to hold a decertification election to oust a union they oppose and believe they would be better off without,” Mix added.
Penske workers in Minneapolis, Minnesota, also voted 26-7 this month to remove IAM District Lodge No. 77 union officials from power.
Decertification petition filings across the nation have increased by more than 40 percent since 2020, according to data published by the NLRB.
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Follow Kaitlin on X / Twitter.
Photo “Penske Store” by Penske.
Good for them. No more union dues taken from their paychecks.