Workers at Tesla's Gigafactory 2 in Buffalo, New York said the automaker fired dozens of employees after they announced plans to form a union, according to a Bloomberg News report. A complaint filed with the US National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) claims one of those fired workers was a member of Workers United's 25-member organizing committee.
The workers went public with their plans on Tuesday, writing in a press release that "unionizing will give us a voice in our workplace that we feel has been ignored to this point."
The organization is currently asking Tesla to sign a Fair Election Principles agreement, which would stipulate that Tesla won't interfere with their right to organize. These firings, if related to the organizing effort, could indicate that Tesla is already engaging in union busting.
The complaint alleges that the layoffs were a form of "collective retaliation.”
Apple CEO Tim Cook said Thursday that the majority of iPhones sold in the U.S. in the current fiscal quarter will be sourced from India, while iPads and other devices will come from Vietnam as the company works to avoid the impact of President Trump’s tariffs on its business. Apple’s earnings for the first three months of the year topped Wall Street’s expectations thanks to high demand for its iPhones, and the company said tariffs had a limited effect on the fiscal second quarter’s results. Cook added that for the current quarter, assuming things don’t change, Apple expects to see $900 million added to its costs as a result of the tariffs.