The Federal Monitor responsible for an on-going investigation into corruption at the United Auto Workers union has found UAW President Shawn Fain wrongly retaliated against the second-ranking leader of the union when he sought to strip her of many of her responsibilities in February of 2024.
In his twelfth report to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, the monitor–lawyer Neil Barofsky–found Fain’s accusations against union Secretary-Treasurer Margaret Mock were “either unsupported or outright unfounded.”
The introduction to the Report reads, in part:
…the Monitor concludes that Mock was falsely accused of misconduct, subjected to retaliatory action by Fain, and improperly stripped of her responsibility for various departments and board assignments. The allegations against her—centered on claims that she “weaponized” financial policies, obstructed Union operations, and sought to improperly influence Board votes—were either unsupported or outright unfounded. Instead, the Monitor’s investigation found that Mock consistently and strictly applied Union policy, guided by a commitment to accountability in the wake of the UAW’s past financial scandals.
The Report also establishes that Fain “acted on a premeditated plan to take action against Mock–one that aligned with Fain’s earlier, widely reported warning that he would ‘slit the (expletive) throats’ of anyone who interfered with his staff.”
Barofsky found the actions taken against Mock were “unjustified and violative of the UAW’s Constitution and Ethical Practices Code” and should be “immediately reversed” by the union’s International Executive Board.
The Federal Monitor is responsible for investigating and reviewing allegations of misconduct and for making quarterly reports to the Court as part of an effort to provide oversight of the UAW, following a lengthy public corruption scandal that sent two former union presidents to federal prison for stealing union funds, taking bribes, and breaking labor laws.
The Monitor also found that Fain used the allegations as the basis for removing eleven departments from Mock’s supervision, reassigning nine of them to himself.
Click here to read or download the Monitor’s report.
Click here to read the article about the report from The Detroit News.