The UAW’s Culture of Corruption

A court-appointed monitor reports the union has a way to go

By Michael Saltsman and Charlyce Bozzello.

"President Ray Curry of the United Auto Workers is “committed to transparency” and rooting out corruption. The union’s court-appointed monitor tells a different story.

Neil Barofsky, whom the Justice Department tapped to monitor the UAW as part of a settlement with the union, filed a status report with the court this week that claims the union’s cooperativeness has “veered sharply in the wrong direction.”

The settlement came after a yearslong investigation found top union officials guilty of embezzling hundreds of thousands of members’ dues money and other funds to bankroll leaders’ opulent lifestyles. Court documents describe parties with top-shelf liquor and stays at five-star resorts.

Mr. Barofsky’s oversight is meant to bring the UAW’s culture of corruption to an end. His report suggests that the union has a way to go. 

The report details how the union failed to provide the relevant information needed to complete the investigation. Mr. Barofsky notes that union leaders were worried this information would become public. The officials also slowed “production of other investigative materials,” and “declined to timely share certain information about . . . efforts to implement compliance reforms.”

Further, the report says, they worked to conceal an investigation into the “mishandling of a sum of cash” by a senior official. This “pattern of uncooperative conduct” eventually forced a meeting with the Justice Department.

Despite these roadblocks, Mr. Barofsky reports that five new investigations have been opened since his initial report in November 2021. All told, he is working on 19 investigations into alleged bad actors at the union. His court appointment gives him the power to “investigate possible fraud or corruption within the union” and discipline UAW officials and members.

In response to the report, the union says it remains committed to “robust reforms.” The report does acknowledge that the union “appears to be” back on track after much intervention. But Mr. Barofsky has expressed “optimism about the UAW’s cooperation” before, only to be disappointed.

This update couldn’t come at a worse time for the United Auto Workers. Next week in Detroit, the union will hold its first constitutional convention since the 2020 settlement. Members of the union’s International Executive Board will be chosen by direct election, rather than the previous delegate system that favored union insiders. More than 60% of members voted to make the switch to this “one member, one vote” system. Several have launched campaigns to challenge the union’s leadership.

That challenge appears to be well-deserved. The cultural change Mr. Barofsky seeks has yet to arrive, and members may rightly decide that new leadership is necessary to achieve it.

Mr. Saltsman is managing director of the Employment Policies Institute. Ms. Bozzello is communications director at the Center for Union Facts."