Mack Trucks worker Will Lehman announces 2026 campaign for UAW president on a platform for rank-and-file power

"The time has come to revive our revolutionary ideals," Lehman declared in launching his campaign.

Dear readers, Will Lehman, a Mack Trucks worker in Macungie, Pennsylvania, has announced his campaign for president of the United Auto Workers in the 2026 elections, advancing a program to abolish the pro-corporate bureaucracy and transfer power to the rank and file. Lehman launched his candidacy with a campaign website, WillforUAWPresident.org, and a video outlining his election program. Lehman, who won nearly 5,000 votes in the 2022 UAW election despite massive voter suppression and a historically low 9 percent turnout, is calling on workers to begin organizing now to secure his nomination at the UAW Constitutional Convention, to be held June 15–18. Lehman's announcement comes amid a deepening crisis in the auto industry. Since the beginning of 2024, more than 21,000 auto jobs have been eliminated. GM has cut Detroit's Factory Zero to a single shift, eliminating 1,140 jobs; Ford has extended layoffs at key facilities; and thousands of Stellantis workers remain idled. These attacks follow the 2023 "stand-up strike," which isolated workers and paved the way for further concessions and job cuts. Read the report Lehman outlined four fundamental demands: 1. Abolish the UAW bureaucracy's dictatorship. End the grip of the apparatus, purge parasitic officials, build rank-and-file committees and transfer decision-making power to workers on the shop floor. 2. End labor-management collaboration. Replace decades of concessions with a class struggle program: full recovery of lost wages, a zero-layoff policy, company-paid healthcare, and a 30-hour workweek with no loss of pay. 3. Reject nationalism and trade war. Unite American, Canadian and Mexican workers against the transnational corporations. 4. Mobilize workers against war and dictatorship. Use the industrial power of the working class to defend democratic rights. In his launch video, Lehman exposed the vast gulf separating the apparatus from rank-and-file workers. The UAW controls $1.1 billion in assets, with hundreds of officials earning six-figure salaries. "These officials sit in the top 5 percent of income earners in the United States," Lehman states. "They are not subject to the same economic shocks we face." His campaign, he stresses, "is not about getting me into some cushy office at Solidarity House." He will remain on the shop floor. "The aim of this campaign is not to replace one official with another, but to abolish the bureaucracy and transfer power to the rank and file." At the conclusion of his launch video, Lehman states, "I am running as a socialist and an internationalist. Socialism means a society run by the working class, not the billionaires, who profit off our exploitation. We must reject every attempt to divide us by race, nationality or ethnicity and fight to unite workers across borders in a common struggle." He calls on UAW members to take an active role in the campaign. In particular, he urges workers to "demand that your local hold a well-publicized meeting at which delegates to the UAW Constitutional Convention will be selected democratically." He calls on workers to "elect delegates, or become a delegate yourself, to the UAW Constitutional Convention for your local to ensure that I am nominated as a candidate." Invoking the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution, Lehman concluded, "As the great Tom Paine wrote, 'These are the times that try men's souls.' The time has come to revive our revolutionary ideals." Read the report World Socialist Web Site We're powered by the support of our readers and workers. Make a contribution today to the World Socialist Web Site. This email was sent to alitealbum.wsws@blogger.com. If you want to, you can unsubscribe. We rely on your financial support and your participation. © Copyright 2026, World Socialist Web Site, wsws.org. All rights reserved.