Tesla fires 30 supporters of organizing union efforts just days after announcing

Just days after the announcement of a nascent union at its Buffalo facility, Tesla fired more than 30 of its supporters, according to the union.
Tesla Workers United, a union, has filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board, claiming that the company illegally fired its supporters.
The complaint alleges that 18 employees were fired “in retaliation for union activity and to discourage union activity,” however, a statement from the union claimed that more than 30 employees were terminated. The firings were announced to have come on the heels of the union organizing effort that was declared earlier this week.
Arian Berek, one of the fired employees quoted in the union’s statement, exclaimed, “I feel blindsided!” ”
After I contracted Covid, I had to take a bereavement leave as I was out of the office. After I returned to work and was told I was exceeding expectations, Wednesday came along. I find it shameful that this is likely a retaliatory action in response to the committee announcement.
People who worked on labeling data collected for Tesla’s Autopilot technology were fired. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, has lauded the work of this group, hailing it as the “Holy Grail” of the company’s self-driving technology.
He told investors in April 2021 that they were getting quite good at auto labeling. After the trainers have trained the training system, the system automatically labels the data, and the human laborers only need to review the labeling to ensure its accuracy and make any necessary edits.
Union supporters object to productivity expectations that they deem “unfair, unattainable, ambiguous and ever changing,” as well as the company’s purported monitoring of their keystrokes in order to measure their work.
”
We are enraged. This will not impede our progress. We will not be deterred. Although they seem to be trying to scare us, I believe they have unintentionally started a stampede. This can be done. In the union’s statement, Sara Costantino, a current Tesla employee and organizing committee member, declared her belief that, “we will do this.”
Cars are not built by the plant in Buffalo. Aside from constructing Autopilot labeling systems, it manufactures solar panels and other associated items.
Starbucks Workers United union, having organized more than 200 Starbucks stores in just over a year, and the Service Employees International Union are both providing support for the new union. In Western New York, the organization Starbucks Workers United achieved its first success in Buffalo, which has since become a stronghold.
Tesla has previously been accused of unlawfully terminating union advocates at its California plant, its first for producing cars. The union’s filing to hold votes among employees at the plant has not been successful in its attempts to organize it.
In tweets, Musk has been critical of unions, one of which was ordered to be deleted by the NLRB three years after it was posted.
Tesla denied the accusation that they had fired employees in response to a union campaign, calling it a “false allegation” in a Thursday blog post. Instead, Tesla attributed the firings to poor performance reviews.
Tesla said in the post that the impacted employees were identified on February 3, 2023, preceding the announcement of the union campaign. ”
Approximately 10 days after, we became aware of organizing activities. In hindsight, it was officially identified that one of the 27 impacted employees was part of the union campaign. This exercise came before any union campaign.