CNH Burlington workers cheer at a rally on Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. (Courtesy of UAW)
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“This is not a funeral. This is a fight!” said UAW Region 4 Director Brandon Campbell, to cheers, according to the Burlington Hawk Eye. “They’re trying to close this plant to pad their own damn pockets and to try to destroy the working-class people who would dare to simply command their fair share. They’re doing it because of corporate greed.”
UAW Vice President Laura Dickerson pointed out Burlington has given CNH more than $22 million in tax abatements since 1997, over $12 million since 2010, and $3.4 million in local tax increment finance funding in recent years.
“So where did that money go?” Dickerson asked. “We helped this company experience record profits. They have experienced $8.7 billion in profits and $7.6 billion in total revenue. Does that sound like a company that should be shutting the doors?”
The closure even brought out UAW President Shawn Fain to town, who had strong words for the company.
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UAW President Shawn Fain speaks at a CNH Burlington workers rally on Friday, Nov. 7, 2025. (Courtesy of UAW)
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“I’d love to say it’s good to be here today, but the fact is I’m actually pissed off that I’m here today,” Fain said. “I’m sick and tired of seeing the same scenario play out in America over and over again because of corporate greed.
“This company told us just last week that they’re closing this plant because it’ll save them just under $17 million, with an ‘M,’ dollars a year … on an annual profit of over $2 billion dollars,” he added. “For less than one percentage point of their profits, they want to dump an economic bomb on the Burlington community.”
The Hawk Eye printed more colorful Shawn Fain remarks that you should definitely go read in full here. (A sample: “These bastards want it all! (Expletive) ’em!”)
There’s no closing date announced for the plant as of right now, UAW Local 807 President Nick Guernsey said, and thus workers will continue to bargain the contract through its renewal in April. But the impending closure, if it happens, will be “devastating,” he noted.
“I think you’ll hear a lot of people say, ‘Well, that [doesn’t] affect me very much.’ But it does affect you. It’s going to affect you,” Guernsey said. “Ask the people of Mount Pleasant [about when] they closed [the Motorola factory] and what Motorola’s [closure] did to Mount Pleasant. We’re facing the same thing here.”
Solidarity: Learn more and sign a petition supporting the workers here.
Are you a Burlington CNH worker? Email me.
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Amie Rivers
Newsletter Editor, Iowa Starting Line
Member, COURIER United (WGA East)
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Rural hospitals? Never heard of her: At her first in-person town hall in more than a year, Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks told Iowans in Keosauqua on Monday she thinks she “strengthened and preserved Medicaid” when she voted to approve President Donald Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill—despite attendees pointing out that rural Iowa hospitals with large numbers of patients on Medicaid are likely to close as a result of the bill’s cuts. (Miller-Meeks also told the crowd she had “always supported releasing the Epstein files,” but she then did not vote to do so on Wednesday.)
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Community college settles 3rd human trafficking case: Western Iowa Tech Community College in Sioux City agreed to a third settlement involving human trafficking of international students—this time, in a case involving 21 students. This one was settled for $2.5 million, which brings the total to nearly $8 million, all while the college denies the allegation that it engaged in human trafficking when it recruited students to come to the college and forced them to work at meatpacking plants.
- Did you detassel corn as a teenager? That quintessential Iowa teen job is increasingly being outsourced by the seed companies to migrant laborers instead, according to Iowa Workforce Development data.
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Food drive for workers: As the shutdown continues (as of this writing), the Quad City Federation of Labor and AFGE 2119 is holding food and hygiene drives to help government and essential workers. Drop-offs are Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. Learn more here.
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Union endorsements: The UAW announced this week its endorsement of Rob Sand for governor. “We’re supporting candidates like Rob Sand who’ve proven they can stand up to corporate America,” said UAW Region 4 Director Brandon Campbell. “Our members, their families, and their neighbors will be sending a clear message to the billionaire class with Rob’s election to the governorship: Iowa is not for sale.” // United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 1846 this week endorsed Zach Wahls for US Senate, as well as Ironworkers Local 111. “Zach Wahls has always stood shoulder-to-shoulder with working people,” said Roger Kail, President of UFCW Local 1846. “He’s fought to raise wages, lower costs, and protect our benefits—and he’s not afraid to take on the corporate special interests that put profits ahead of people.” “He understands the challenges our members and hardworking Iowans face,” said Mike Olvera, Business Manager for Ironworkers Local 111.
- Prices are ‘way down,’ Trump is telling us. But I’ve been to a grocery store. I assume you have, too.
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The housing market is so crappy that the median age of new homebuyers is basically my age.
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Shutdown over, union votes coming back: The National Labor Relations Board website database is finally back online, but so far a postponed UnityPoint vote has not been rescheduled among health care professionals at four Des Moines hospitals.
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Don’t cross the Starbucks picket lines: Starbucks Workers United, which has thousands of members across the country, voted to strike Nov. 13—the company’s “Red Cup Day”—because the company continues to refuse to bargain a contract with its thousands of unionized employees. The picket lines aren’t at every Starbucks—there aren’t any in Iowa, despite there being four unionized Starbucks stores—but the strike involves the whole chain. Learn more about workers’ demands, sign a pledge to boycott Starbucks until the strike is over (don’t be a scab!), and donate to the strike fund here.
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- Wells Fargo in West Des Moines is laying off 12 workers by Friday, 23 workers by Nov. 28, one worker by Dec. 12, 63 workers by Dec. 26, and 26 by Jan. 2.
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BHFO in Cedar Rapids is closing and laying off 46 workers by Nov. 26. Read more here.
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Ceilley Pallets in Waterloo is closing and laying off 12 workers by Nov. 27. Read more here.
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Mason City Clinic in Mason City is laying off 147 workers by Dec. 31. Read more about a potential WARN Act violation here.
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RELCO in Cedar Rapids is closing and laying off 34 workers by Dec. 31. Read more here.
- RTX in Cedar Rapids is laying off three workers by Dec. 31.
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Toyota Financial Services in Cedar Rapids is closing and laying off 54 workers by Dec. 31. Read more here.
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“We’ve been standing up to government since the 1800s,” a Chicago Ironworker says in a recent video about federal troops intimidating Chicago residents.
“If Donald Trump thinks he can come in here and send his police force to hold us down, he’s wrong.”
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Thanks for reading. This newsletter was written by Amie Rivers. It was edited by Paula Solis.
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