FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
JUNE 19, 2026
PRESS INQUIRIES: NAVRUZ BAUM, UNITEALLWORKERS4DEMOCRACY@gmail.com, (201) 615-4323
UAW Votes to Divest from Israel Bonds — Largest US Labor Union to Divest
Rank-and-file members attending the 39th UAW Constitutional Convention forced the vote as part of a class struggle program to organize workplace action to respond to ICE, mass layoffs, and more.
DETROIT, MI — Delegates to the 39th UAW Constitutional Convention voted on June 18 to divest from Israel Bonds, making United Auto Workers the largest US labor union to divest after nearly three years of US-backed Israeli genocide in Gaza and 78 years of Israeli settler colonialism throughout the Levant.
UAW made history in the fall of 2023 when it became the largest US labor union to publicly call for a ceasefire. But until now, the UAW has continued to invest at least $400,000 of member dues in Israel Bonds, a company that funnels unrestricted loans to the Israeli government, including the Israeli military. The true size of the UAW’s investment may be much higher.
The divestment vote was 321 in favor, 287 against, and was organized by Unite All Workers for Democracy (UAWD) and UAW Labor for Palestine, part of the Labor for Palestine coalition.
The UAW vote joins a growing divestment movement with deep roots. In the 1970s, the UAW Arab Workers Caucus picketed UAW events, struck, and organized for the 1974 UAW Constitutional Convention demanding divestment. More recently, public investment funds in Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina, and New York City have divested from Israel Bonds, and workers in Belgium, France, Greece, Italy, Spain, Sweden, and Morocco have refused to handle weapons and Israeli-bound cargo. Since 2004, Labor for Palestine has led organizing within the US labor movement to honor the Palestinian-led picket line put forward by the Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions.
UAW leadership initially excluded the divestment amendment from the Convention agenda. On June 17, members forced the measure to a floor vote by clearing a 128 delegate threshold required to move constitutional amendments out of committee. In advance of the Convention, UAWD members brought the amendment to their membership meetings in locals across the country. Members at locals 869, 1115, 2320, 2325, and 7902 had voted to send versions of the amendment to the Convention; a prior UAW International Executive Board vote on divestment failed in May 2024.
UAWD also brought a broader class struggle program to the Convention — including amendments to protect workers from ICE raids and combat mass layoffs — and a stronger pro-Palestine resolution that would have additionally protected workers who strike to interrupt weapons shipments to Israel. Those measures were not approved, but the open debate on questions of using militant strike tactics to face ICE and the divestment victory demonstrates the growing power of anti-imperialist rank-and-file organizing within the UAW.
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About UAWD: Unite All Workers for Democracy is a grassroots movement of rank-and-file UAW members, united in our vision of class struggle unionism and fighting to build a militant, democratic UAW.
