Shawn Fain and the United UAW slate are headed toward a sweeping victory in the union’s internal elections for its International Executive Board. The results will not be finalized for some time, but the unofficial results are unequivocal: United Auto Workers members are overwhelmingly backing Fain and the militant direction he is taking the union.

Voter turnout was low, about 10 percent of the total number of active and retired members, and appears to be on track for a lower total vote count than when the UAW held its first direct election of top union officers in 2022. Previously, officers were elected by delegates at the union’s annual convention, a system that helped entrench the ruling Administration Caucus in power for more than seven decades.

Fain eked out an upset victory against incumbent President Ray Curry in a runoff election and was officially sworn in as the first directly elected UAW president in March 2023. I worked for him as chief of staff at the UAW from 2023 to earlier this year. Now, three and a half years later, Fain is on track to become the first directly elected president to win reelection.

The field was considerably more crowded this time, with more candidates contesting the top officer positions and regional director seats. Fain’s UAW United slate fielded candidates for eleven of the twelve positions on the International Executive Board. Despite heavy opposition, United UAW candidates are winning by overwhelming margins, demonstrating widespread membership support for Fain’s aggressive approach to bargaining and organizing.

That support has been earned. Under Fain’s leadership, the UAW’s historic 2023 stand-up strike won record agreements at the Big Three, delivering 25 percent wage increases, eliminating wage tiers, restoring cost-of-living adjustments, securing bonuses for retirees for the first time in decades, winning the right to strike over product commitments, and bringing electric vehicle battery production under the union’s master agreements.

The union then institutionalized its aggressive, high-participation approach to bargaining and began rolling it out across the industries it represents, winning life-changing contracts for workers at Daimler Truck, American Axle, Allison Transmission, Cornell University, Rolls-Royce, and other employers. Following the success at the Big Three, the UAW successfully unionized the workers at Volkswagen’s sole US assembly plant in Tennessee, which became the first foreign-owned Southern auto plant to be organized in US history. Volkswagen workers won a first contract earlier this year.

The election results also send an unmistakable message to the federally appointed monitor, Neil Barofsky, who Fain and I believe has repeatedly abused the extraordinary power of his office to try to undermine Fain’s reelection chances.

Barofsky, an attorney with the law firm Jenner & Block, has publicly accused Fain and me of retaliating against other union leaders in a series of scathing reports. We have vigorously contested those allegations, which we believe are grossly inaccurate and politically motivated.

Those reports followed a remarkable confrontation between Fain and Barofsky over the union’s support for a ceasefire in Gaza and opposition to Israel’s genocide against Palestinians.

In December 2023, the UAW became the largest union to call for a ceasefire. Following the announcement, Barofsky called Fain, ostensibly in his personal capacity rather than as the federally appointed monitor, to challenge the union’s position. During that call, Barofsky repeatedly suggested that the union’s statements were antisemitic and “crossed a line.” Fain understood the call as an implicit threat from a federal monitor wielding extraordinary authority over the union’s internal affairs.

Barofsky subsequently forwarded an email he had received from the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) to the entire International Executive Board, clearly implying his support for concerns raised by the ADL about the growing support for the union’s ceasefire position among locals. These interactions culminated in a heated confrontation at the February 2024 board meeting, where multiple members of the board objected to the monitor’s interference in the union’s political affairs.

During that meeting, which was recorded in the official minutes, Barofsky denied saying the call was made in his personal capacity and claimed that he never characterized the union’s position as antisemitic. He also claimed that Fain had dismissed his concerns about the suffering of Jewish people as “bulls — t.”

Unfortunately for Barofsky, Fain recorded their conversation. In July 2026, Drop Site News obtained, authenticated, transcribed, and published the recording. The transcript revealed that Barofsky did say he was calling Fain in his personal capacity and that he repeatedly raised accusations of antisemitism. It also showed that Fain’s reference to “bulls — t” concerned Israel’s killing tens of thousands of innocent civilians — not the suffering of Jewish people. Following publication of the recording, Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib called for Barofsky’s resignation.

Now, despite the monitor’s investigations, public accusations, and extraordinary interventions into the union’s internal affairs, UAW members are delivering a strong vote of confidence in Fain’s leadership. And Fain is already preparing for the next fight. The centerpiece of his strategy for the 2028 Big Three negotiations is winning back pensions and retiree health care for all autoworkers. Building on the historic 2023 agreements, these victories would eliminate two of the most consequential remaining tiers imposed on autoworkers over previous decades.

Much was at stake during these elections. The labor movement, as I have argued elsewhere, is in serious crisis. Fain ran for leadership of America’s most powerful industrial union on a platform of taking that crisis seriously by using the UAW’s resources to wage a real fight for working-class people in this country, both within the union and outside of it. It’s why I worked for him for three years. His opponents in this election wanted to return the union to the days when it was rolling over for the bosses and lacked a broader vision for what organized labor can do, even in its weakened state.

The message from UAW members coming out of this election is clear: they want their union to keep fighting, keep winning, and keep moving forward. Anyone who cares about building a fighting labor movement should be heartened.