Teamsters won't cross picket lines to deliver parts, GM cars
The UAW ordered a national strike against GM today, 10 days after the union's contract with the automaker expired. The parties have been negotiating since July 23 without agreeing on terms of a new labor deal.
Officials from GM and the union continue to bargain today even as auto workers set up picket lines at GM plants across the country.
The Teamsters' statement says the union represents 10,000 automotive transport workers, who ferry everything from components to completed vehicles.
Most Teamster contracts include "sympathy language" that precludes Teamsters from losing their own jobs if they decline to cross the picket lines of other striking unions.
"We are standing by our UAW brothers and sisters," said Galen Munroe, a Teamsters spokesman in Washington, D.C.