Will Lehman

04/13/2026

Graduate workers at Harvard University are taking a courageous stand against one of the wealthiest institutions in the world. With a strike deadline of April 21, 2026 set, they are saying: enough is enough. I fully support your struggle and urge all workers, academic and industrial alike, to rally behind it.

But your fight will not be won through the goodwill of Harvard's administration, and it will not be won through the UAW apparatus. Form rank-and-file committees now, independent of the bureaucracy and democratically controlled by workers themselves, to take the conduct of this fight into your own hands and prevent a last-minute sellout at the bargaining table. The pattern at Columbia, UC, and in past Harvard strikes makes clear: the apparatus exists not to champion workers, but to contain them.

Will Lehman fully supports the Harvard graduate worker strike but warns that victory requires forming rank-and-file committees independent of the UAW apparatus, which has a documented history of suppressing strikes and selling out workers.

04/13/2026

As a candidate for UAW president, I condemn the deportation of University of Washington graduate student worker and UAW member Kennedy Orwa and his 13-year-old son through Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. His student visa was rescinded without explanation, and within hours he and his son were being deported. Protesters who tried to stop it were met with police dispersal orders and threats of arrest.

The UAW International and President Shawn Fain have issued not a word to defend Orwa or mobilize the membership. Their silence is bound up with their accommodation to Trump's economic nationalist agenda, which scapegoats immigrants and pits worker against worker to serve the corporations. Immigrant workers are not our enemies. They are our coworkers, neighbors, and fellow workers. The defense of immigrant workers is inseparable from the fight for the social rights of the entire working class. An injury to one is an injury to all.

Will Lehman condemns the deportation of University of Washington graduate student and UAW member Kennedy Orwa and his son, calling on UAW members to mobilize against this assault on immigrant workers and democratic rights.

04/13/2026

The Harvard Graduate Students Union (HGSU-UAW) has set a strike deadline of 12:01 am on April 21, 2026, for 4,000 Teaching Fellows, Research Assistants, and other academic workers

04/13/2026

Kennedy Orwa, a PhD student at the University of Washington, was detained at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on April 7 and deported with his 13-year-old son the following day.

04/13/2026

The UAW’s net assets and bureaucrats’ salaries rose last year while strike activity fell to near zero.

04/10/2026

Reporters from the World Socialist Web Site spoke to workers as they passed through the factory gates, shortly after reports emerged that the US government is moving toward automatic registration for a potential military draft.

04/10/2026

The WSWS has received messages of support for Lehman’s campaign from workers at the Kadıköy, Maltepe, and Şişli municipalities in Istanbul.

04/08/2026

Joe David and I are standing as delegates for UAW Local 677 at Mack Trucks in elections on Thursday, April 9. We are running as part of an insurgent slate of workers running as delegates throughout the UAW, not to get cushy jobs inside the apparatus, but to abolish it and transfer power to the rank and file.

The UAW delegate process is obscure, inconsistent across locals, and too often handled with little notice to members. If this process is left in the hands of Shawn Fain and the Solidarity House bureaucracy, workers will be offered only candidates loyal to that apparatus and the corporations.

In 2026, workers must come forward as challengers to the established order.

Will Lehman and Joe David are standing as delegates for UAW Local 677 as part of an insurgent slate throughout the UAW. They are running not to get cushy jobs inside the apparatus, but to abolish it and transfer power to the rank and file.

04/07/2026

One year ago, Ronald Adams Sr. was killed at Stellantis Dundee Engine because the safety systems designed to protect him had been systematically dismantled. Today, MIOSHA has still not released its investigation results. Stellantis and the UAW refused to answer questions from his family and co-workers. That is not a coincidence. That is a cover-up, and it must end now.

Workers cannot wait for Stellantis, the UAW bureaucracy, or MIOSHA to act. The only answer is for workers on every shop floor to build rank-and-file safety committees, democratically controlled and answerable to workers, with the real power to halt production over unsafe conditions. The life of Ronald Adams Sr. demands it. The lives of every worker who will go to work tomorrow demand it.

Ronald Adams Sr. was killed one year ago because safety systems had been systematically dismantled. MIOSHA has still not released its investigation. Workers must build rank-and-file safety committees and assert control over safety and production themselves.

04/07/2026

The Nexteer Rank-and-File Committee issued this statement after workers at the Saginaw, Michigan parts plant rejected a UAW-backed contract by 96 percent.