{"id":141452,"date":"2019-11-21T16:41:23","date_gmt":"2019-11-21T21:41:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thedetroitbureau.com\/?p=141452"},"modified":"2019-11-21T16:43:42","modified_gmt":"2019-11-21T21:43:42","slug":"jones-resigns-uaw-presidency-before-union-expels-him","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/2019\/11\/jones-resigns-uaw-presidency-before-union-expels-him\/","title":{"rendered":"Jones Resigns UAW Presidency Before Union Expels Him"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
UAW President Gary Jones resigned before the union could vote to expel him from the UAW.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The UAW announced Thursday that Gary Jones, through his attorney, has informed the UAW that he was resigning as President of the UAW effective immediately rather than face a trial for misconduct under the union constitution that could have led to his expulsion from the union.<\/p>\n

The resignation of Jones, once a\u00a0protege of former President Steve Yokich, the architect of the modern UAW, ends his scandal-ridden, 18-month tenure as the UAW\u2019s top officer. It also\u00a0clears the way for the UAW to elect a new president, Brian Rothenberg, the UAW\u2019s director of communication told TheDetroitBureau.com. The union\u2019s executive board has not\u00a0set a date for selecting a new president, but it is expected to be soon, he said.<\/p>\n

Rory Gamble, a long-time union officer, became the UAW\u2019s acting president Nov. 3, when Jones took a leave of absence after a close associate was charged by federal prosecutors with embezzling money from the UAW\u2019s treasury and political funds by filing false invoices.\u00a0Jones hasn\u2019t charged but federal prosecutors said the FBI found more than $30,000 in cash in Jones garage during a mid-August search of his home in suburban Detroit.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

(UAW expels President Gary Jones, aide Pearson from union)<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Gamble is currently in the midst of negotiating a new labor contract with FCA, which was made more difficult this week when General Motors filed a lawsuit\u00a0against Fiat Chrysler accusing its rival of racketeering in an effort to win better contracts from the UAW.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Vance Pearson, right, has been indicted on several charges in the ongoing investigation. He worked closely with Jones.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

One hole in GM\u2019s theory, however, is that union members actually voted down one the contracts FCA\u2019s corruption had tainted.\u00a0After the contract was rejected by union members, the UAW negotiated a new contract with FCA that also served as the pattern for the union\u2019s 2015 contract with GM,\u00a0one knowledgeable observer told TheDetroitBureau.com.<\/p>\n

Putting Jones on trial under the union’s internal rules was, in part, an effort\u00a0to forestall any effort by the federal government to take over the union because of rampant corruption.<\/p>\n

Gamble had said in an interview with TheDetroitBureau.com earlier this month that he would do whatever was necessary to protect the UAW as an institution and to restore the reputation of the union.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are committed at the UAW to take all necessary steps including continuing to implement ethics reforms and greater financial controls to prevent these type of charges from ever happening again,\u201d Gamble said, including using the constitutional provisions to force Jones out of office if the evidence showed that the union\u2019s president had failed to live up to the his obligations as the union\u2019s top officer.<\/p>\n

(UAW President Jones takes leave of absence from the union)<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Union activists had begun circulating a petition among the UAW\u2019s local chapters, asking for support for the removal of Jones and Pearson. The petition has been supported by at least a half-dozen different locals.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will handle properly any request that comes up through the system,\u201d said Gamble.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Rory Gamble is the acting UAW president and working to enact reforms to rebuild trust with the union’s membership.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Gamble in a move to open up the union\u2019s sometime stifling internal culture also demoted an assistant director of the UAW\u2019s Ford Department who had criticized union local that had voted against ratification of the UAW\u2019s new labor contract with the Ford Motor Co.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the unfolding scandal inside the union also has trigged a lawsuit by General Motors against FCA and three FCA executives engulfed in the scandal and by extension by the former FCA CEO, the late Sergio Marchionne.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile a full accounting of the damage inflicted on GM is unknowable at the time without discovering additional details of the scheme, GM estimates it has incurred massive monetary damage in the form of higher costs that it seeks in relief. The damage is direct, substantial and foreseeable consequence of this bribery scheme orchestrated by FCA Group and the many acts of racketeering that fueled the scheme,\u201d GM\u2019s suit said.<\/p>\n

(UAW President\u2019s Key Aide Faces Federal Charges)<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

The UAW noted in a statement that the Alphons Iacobelli the architect of the effort to bribe UAW officials worked for both FCA and General Motors, and he is currently in prison for his crimes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The UAW announced Thursday that Gary Jones, through his attorney, has informed the UAW that he was resigning as President of the UAW effective immediately rather than face a trial for misconduct under the union constitution that could have led to his expulsion from the union. Details at TheDetroitBureau.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20009,"featured_media":131845,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,8,5,11,13],"tags":[],"make":[51,56,58],"post-state":[],"category_old":[118,150,151,123,191,248,243,138,308,132,288,304,141],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141452"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20009"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=141452"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/141452\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/131845"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=141452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=141452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=141452"},{"taxonomy":"make","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/make?post=141452"},{"taxonomy":"post-state","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post-state?post=141452"},{"taxonomy":"category_old","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/category_old?post=141452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}