Battered by a corruption scandal and facing a historic referendum on whether to change the union’s constitution to allow for the direct election of top officers, the UAW is using the resignation of President Rory Gamble to reshape the union’s top leadership.
Gamble, who was recently hobbled by surgery to both knees, is resigning effective June 30. He is being replaced by Ray Curry, the union’s secretary-treasurer, who will take over July 1. In announcing his resignation, Gamble says the union needs the stability of a younger leader who could serve multiple terms.
“I said on Day One I would hand over the keys to this treasured institution as a clean union,” says Gamble, 65, who took over in late 2019 after the resignation of Gary Jones, who was facing criminal charges to which he pleaded guilty.
“My original intent as a UAW Vice President was to retire at the end of June 2021, and after looking at the progress we have made and the best interests of UAW members for a stable transfer of power, this is the right time for me to turn over the reins,” says Gamble, who enacted several reforms and negotiated a settlementof a lawsuit filed by the U.S. Justice Department, leaving the union with independent overseer of the union’s internal affairs.
Gamble also says he hopes his retirement will usher in a period of multiple-term presidents for the UAW. “You need time to settle in and look at the long-range focus and priorities of our membership, especially in this time of vast technological change.”
Curry, 55, the union’s second Black president, comes to the UAW’s presidency without being touched by the scandal, having served previously as the union’s regional director in the Southeastern U.S.
A native of North Carolina, Curry (pictured below, left) joined the UAW in 1992 while he was working at a Freightliner truck plant. With his intimate knowledge of the South, where he has been active in local politics and local churches and civic organizations, Curry is expected to revive organizing drives to recruit new members at factories owned by foreign-based automakers in Kentucky, Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina as well as the Tesla plant in California and one that will open soon in Texas.
At the same time, the auto industry is on the cusp of a major shift to electric vehicles, and the UAW has been fighting to maintain a presence in the battery plants and assembly plants dedicated to electric cars and trucks.
So far, 12 union officers and officials have been sentenced to prison in the embezzlement scandal, including Jones and his predecessor, Dennis Williams. Curry will be the UAW’s fourth president since 2014.
Curry was elected president by the UAW’s Executive Board, but union members will decide in a referendum later this year whether to approve direct election of top UAW officers.
Curry says in a statement the UAW faces significant challenges but insists the union is in a strong position. “Industry is at a crossroads right now with massive changes in new innovative technologies.” he says. “It is up to us to navigate through this monumental shift in mobility and manufacturing.
“And certainly, our priority – and my priority – is to grow our membership across all sectors, and new sectors, including gaming, higher education, public health, parts suppliers and auto transnationals,” Curry says. “Whether in Charleston, South Carolina, Alabama, New York or California, these workers and educators all deserve a voice in the workplace, and it is our duty to make that happen,” he says.
The UAW also promoted two of its members to work alongside Curry in the union’s reconstituted leadership. Frank Stuglin, the director of UAW Region 1 in Warren, MI, will take over Curry’s role as secretary-treasurer, while Chuck Browning, the director of UAW Region 1A in Taylor, MI, becomes a UAW vice president. Browning will likely head up the union’s Ford department since its current head, Gerald Kariem, is retiring June 30.
Curry’s leadership already is being tested in a strike by 2,900 UAW members at the Volvo Truck plant in Dublin, VA (pictured, below). Since April, union members at Volvo have twice decisively voted down proposed contracts negotiated by Curry; critics say he is now trying to “strike” the membership to get them to accept a substandard contract.
