Take Action to Kill the Cuts on April 8
Dear UAW sibling,
Across Region 6, members have spent the last month taking action to defend lifesaving research funding, win record contracts, win organizing campaign milestones, advance climate justice and immigration justice, and more. Keep reading for more information and ways you can get involved in ongoing work!
Kill the Cuts! National Day of Action 4/8
On Tuesday, April 8th, 2025 workers across the country are standing up and demanding NO cuts to lifesaving research, healthcare, and education. Find an action near you and RSVP here!
The Trump administration’s actions to cut funds for lifesaving NIH research, medical care, and public education is putting working families at risk and will cost billions of dollars of public money. Already in 2025, NIH funding is significantly down from where it was this time last year – posing immediate threats to ongoing clinical trials, lifesaving treatments, jobs, and local economies – for working people in every state.
That’s why today, UAW, ACLU, and other allies sued the Trump administration to reinstate grants that have been canceled because they focus on topics like vaccination, climate change, diversity, “countries of concern,” and the health of women, racial minorities, and LGBTQ+ people. Read the full lawsuit here.
Source: Washington Post
These reckless cuts are dangerous for our health, and dangerous for our economy. They will directly impact:
Millions of families who look to NIH and federally-supported research to produce lifesaving treatments for ailments like cancer, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, and more.
Four million people working in higher education, including many UAW members, whose jobs are on the line.
Millions of students who attend higher education institutions where they train to become nurses, teachers, doctors, scientists, engineers, and otherwise advance the public good.
Communities that depend on higher education and research as their economic engines.
Thousands of UAW members are joining fellow research, healthcare, and education workers across the country to take action on April 8 to build a mass movement to Kill the Cuts. Join an action near you, and find more info at www.killthecuts.org.
Message from Region 6 Director Mike Miller
One of the best ways to fight against the reactionary politics of the current U.S. Administration and Congress is for workers to organize into unions and fight to win social, economic, and political justice for all working people. In Region 6 we have already made significant progress on this front: over 700 Research Coordinators and Consultants at University of Washington and over 600 workers at California Institute of Arts have won certification as part of the UAW since the start of 2025. And thousands more are organizing in several states in the Region and several sectors of the economy.
With all the news and public debate about tariffs and economic nationalism, many members are expressing various concerns with and questions about statements made by the union regarding these topics. This is an important debate to have, as these issues affect not only unionized members in the auto industry, but the working class across the country and around the world. We must both recognize the harms caused by – and work to reverse the damage from – decades of unjust trade policy and, in so doing, ensure that these efforts do not unintentionally harm working people at large.
Tariffs are a complicated issue for our union. But let’s start with one fact that is not complicated. So-called “free trade” agreements have enabled the billionaire class to wreak devastating havoc on all working people. Since neo-liberal politicians passed NAFTA in 1994, corporate executives in the auto industry have closed 60 auto assembly plants in the U.S., as well as countless more independent parts plants in the U.S., and have driven down real wages dramatically for auto workers in the U.S., Mexico, and Canada. This race to the bottom must end. Because free trade agreements have so clearly devastated the livelihoods of so many UAW members, there is widespread support for the idea of tariffs among significant parts of our membership.
Tariffs against entire nations (e.g., China, Canada, and Mexico) are unlikely to help the working class and will likely fan the flames of xenophobia, escalate geopolitical tensions between countries, and generate resentments between workers across the globe. To create good, union, manufacturing jobs in the U.S., tariffs must be accompanied by other measures, such as: industrial policy that encourages capital investment; policies and laws that prevent employers from campaigning against workers in those firms from unionizing; price controls that prevent companies from passing the costs of tariffs on to consumers; and stronger antitrust enforcement to challenge big firms’ monopsony power in labor markers. If corporations are allowed to profiteer off tariffs by passing on higher prices to the consumer, workers more broadly will lose purchasing power from this sellers’ inflation. Of course we must also do our part to help more workers form unions to keep runaway corporate power in check and increase bargaining leverage to increase wages.
Donald Trump and the Republican majorities in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate won elections in 2024 by capitalizing on the economic pain visited upon workers by years of unjust trade deals that mainly benefit corporations and shareholders. During the presidential campaign, President Fain rightly branded Trump a scab for his anti-worker and anti-union politics. Trump has slashed programs that ensure public health at the CDC and life-saving research at the NIH, NSF, NASA, DOE, and other federal agencies to fund tax breaks for billionaires. He is dismantling the NLRB. He is attacking migrant workers for their political stands and immigration status (Mahmoud Khalil and Yunseo Chung at Columbia, Badar Khan Suri at Georgetown, Alireza Doroudi at the University of Alabama, Rumeysa Ozturk at Tufts University, and at least 300 international students who Secretary of State Marco Rubio has stated have had their visas revoked so far). He has stripped over a million federal workers – including 600 UAW members who work at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases – of their union rights.
Just as we will continue to fight these attacks on international and migrant workers here within the U.S., we will continue to work closely with our allies in the Canadian Auto Workers Union and independent auto worker unions in Mexico to improve the working conditions of all North American auto workers. Toward that end, we routinely collaborate on improving trade agreements such as the USMCA and using them in the interests of workers by, for example, using the rapid response mechanism when workers’ rights in any North American country are violated.
As a union, our agenda for working people includes fighting against all the cuts the Trump administration is making to federal funding of science, public health, and the social safety net. That’s why we – along with several allies – sued the Trump Administration today over their draconian cuts to the NIH. This fight as well as the fight against all the Trump Administration’s attacks on workers, immigrants, and international students will continue and must involve all of us. Make sure that you turn out to the Kill the Cuts actions on April 8. You can find a location near you here.
Even as we support measures that undo the injustice of decades of disastrous trade policy, we must mobilize to defend workers rights to organize and bargain collectively. We must also push favorable policies and legislation as part of a broader effort to bring fairness back to manufacturing and to safeguard good, union jobs. We must hold all politicians accountable to improving the lives of working people, and if they fail to do so, we must mobilize against them in the midterm elections and beyond. Toward that end, I would very much appreciate hearing your thoughts on what I’ve shared about our current engagement with the Trump Administration, their tariff and trade policies, and ideas you have for ways we can better fight for improvements to the working conditions of the global working class. Please join a Region 6 Town Hall on April 9 at 6pm Pacific for member discussion on these important issues – register here to receive the Zoom link.
Staff Organizing on the Rise!
600 Faculty and Staff at California Institute for the Arts in Los Angeles won their union election with a resounding 92% YES vote and over 75% of workers participating. Now on to bargain a contract that reflects the respect, stability, and fairness Faculty and Staff deserve!
Researchers at the Allen Institute in Seattle, are forming a union (AIU-UAW), and launched their card authorization campaign with a rally and organizing drive. Momentum was high as workers are organizing wall to wall.
Staff at University of Alaska are also forming a statewide union, and also launched their card authorization drive in late March. Workers held kick off events in Fairbanks, Anchorage, Juneau, Ketchikan, and Sitka.
Root & Rebound Workers ON STRIKE
Staff at Root & Rebound (Local 2320) have been on an unfair labor practice strike for 9 days, fighting to get back to work. Root & Rebound workers provide critical work in the community, supporting people navigating reentry and reducing the harms of mass incarceration. After weeks of union-busting from management — unpaid wages, termination of health coverage, and mandatory unpaid furloughs — workers made the difficult decision to strike. Root & Rebound workers are fighting for their clients, and for respect and dignity in the workplace. You can support Root & Rebound workers on strike by joining the picket line or contributing to the mutual aid fund. One day longer, one day stronger!
Record Contract at Adel Wiggins
Members at the Adel Wiggins Unit of Local 509 ratified a 4 year extension agreement that provides for more raises for members over the next 3.5 years than the last two contracts combined. Members will be paying 40% less in health insurance premiums by the end of the contract, with some potentially saving more than $5000 per year by the end of the agreement. Factoring health insurance savings, the average member will be getting an immediate 7.11% raise and a 25.53% raise over the lifetime of the agreement. The agreement also makes substantial strides towards ending the two-tiered wage system that has been in place for over 20 years – closing the gap between the two tiers by over 75%, down to less than a dollar difference on average. Over the last four months members have been holding rallies twice a week, every week, to demonstrate their power and demands clearly to the company. The record-breaking agreement ratified today is the fruit of members’ efforts to fight for what they deserve.
More Updates from Across the Region
Local Updates: After voting to affiliate with Region 6 last year and subsequently winning a massive contract fight, CAPS/Local 1115 have now approved new bylaws by 92% of the voting membership. This achievement reflects CAPS members’ collective commitment to making our union more democratic and member-driven. Members of the Local 4591 International Workgroup and the Washington State Labor Council are hosting a Know Your Rights Training for members to learn about their rights in the workplace regardless of citizenship or visa status.
Labor Community: Region 6 members from around California were proud to join United Farm Workers, the California Federation of Labor, and others across the labor movement to march for immigrant worker justice in Delano, CA, in honor of Cesar Chavez Day on March 31.
Climate Justice: Join the Coalition Launch for SB 787, UAW’s bill to create a supply chain office in the California Energy Commission that can grow union jobs in the battery, wind, and heat pump industries! Join Thursday April 3 at 3pm via zoom!
Upcoming events
Kill the Cuts! National Day of Action: April 8 at a location near you! More info here.
Region 6 Gender Justice & Civil Human Rights Committee meeting: April 14, 6-7pm via Zoom. RSVP here.
Region 6 Political Action (CAP/PAC) meeting: April 17, 6-7pm via zoom. RSVP here.
Region 6 Education & Communications Committee meeting: week of April 21, TBD. RSVP here.
Region 6 Just Transition Committee meeting: April 24, 6-7pm via zoom. Fill out this survey to get connected.
The Region 6 Injury to One Is an Injury to All Conference: May 3-4 at the University of Washington in Seattle. Contact your Local for more info and to join.
Region 6 Summer School: July 24-27 at Cal State Los Angeles. More info to come.
The full 2025 UAW Education Department conference schedule is now available, with multiple options upcoming at the Walter & May Reuther Family Education Center in Onaway, MI. Contact your Local for more info and to join.