Autoworkers ratify contract with Stellantis, on track to approve Ford deal

Members of the United Auto Workers (UAW) union have ratified a contract with Stellantis and appear to be on track to approve a similar deal with Ford, the union’s vote tracker showed Friday.

With workers narrowly approving an agreement with General Motors (GM) on Thursday, the months-long battle between the union and the three major automakers appears to be drawing to a close.

Unionized workers at Stellantis facilities voted resoundingly in favor of a 54-month contract with the Jeep maker, with about 68 percent of some 26,000 workers voting to ratify the deal as of Friday morning. 

While the votes for several small facilities have yet to appear on UAW’s tracker, the remaining ballots would not be able to overcome the current 9,650-vote margin in favor of the contract, according to CNBC.

The union’s contract with Ford also appears to be heading toward ratification, with 61.7 percent of workers voting in favor of the agreement thus far. 

The ease with which the Stellantis’s and Ford’s ratification votes have occurred stands in contrast to that of GM, where autoworkers at several major facilities in Michigan, Indiana, Missouri and Tennessee voted down the agreement in recent days.

However, after one of the automaker’s largest facilities in Texas voted in favor of the deal, it passed Thursday with 54.7 percent support.

The agreements reached with each of the three major U.S. automakers after six weeks of strikes feature a 25 percent general wage increase, including an 11 percent immediate pay raise after ratification.

The union also won back several concessions made by autoworkers during the 2007-2008 financial crisis, such as cost-of-living adjustments and a more rapid progression to the top wage rate.