The attempt by the United Auto Workers union to gain a stronger foothold in the politically conservative South faltered in mid-May when workers at a Mercedes-Benz plant in Vance, Alabama, voted against joining the union.

Performers who play characters like Mickey Mouse and Goofy at the Disneyland Resort in Southern California voted overwhelmingly in May to join the Actors’ Equity Association.

Starbucks is slated to begin bargaining in late April with delegates from its 400 unionized stores after agreeing to end its two-year campaign against union organizing.


After the first day of a planned weeklong strike, the California State University faculty union reached a tentative contract with the university that included big raises for the lowest paid instructors, who comprise over half of the union’s 29,000 members.

After striking for more than three weeks in November, the Portland, Oregon school district and the union representing teachers, school counselors and other employees reached an agreement that boosts salaries and planning time. But the new contract does not place a cap on class size, as educators had wanted.

The United Auto Workers is targeting nearly 150,000 workers at U.S. factories owned by 13 automakers, including large foreign-owned companies and electric vehicle manufacturers, in one of its largest organizing drives in history.