Dear Wikimedians,Following the Wikimedia Foundation's decision[1] not to voluntarily recognize Wiki Workers United (WWU), a new community petition has been launched calling on the Board of Trustees to intervene.
The petition asks the Board to instruct the CEO to voluntarily recognize the union and begin collective bargaining without further delay.
During the Q&A at Wikimania,[2] CEO Bernadette Meehan was asked whether the Foundation would voluntarily recognize the union, noting that more than 70% of eligible US staff had signed authorization cards and that over a thousand Wikimedians had signed a petition supporting recognition. She responded that the Foundation had received the request and would review it after Wikimania before making a decision. Two days later, on 27 July, the Foundation announced that it would not voluntarily recognize the union. The Foundation's statement says that, while it respects employees' right to unionize, it believes the appropriate path is a secret-ballot election conducted by the US National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) before recognition is considered.
Wiki Workers United has announced that it already has the support of a supermajority of eligible US-based employees through signed authorization cards. We believe voluntary recognition would have respected that democratic choice without requiring a lengthy election process. Instead, the Foundation's decision to require an NLRB election has raised concerns that the process will be unnecessarily prolonged, consume additional staff time and donor resources, and further damage trust between the Foundation, its employees, and the Wikimedia community. We also believe that Foundation's public messaging is inconsistent with its stated support for workers' right to organize.
The Board of Trustees now has an opportunity to prevent this dispute from escalating further. Voluntarily recognizing Wiki Workers United would help rebuild trust between the Foundation, its staff, and the Wikimedia community, while avoiding a prolonged dispute that risks causing lasting damage to the Foundation's reputation and its relationship with volunteers and donors.
If you believe the Wikimedia Foundation should voluntarily recognize Wiki Workers United, please consider signing the petition:
* https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/2026_recognize_Wiki_Workers_United_petitionYou can help by sharing it with your local Wikimedia communities, affiliates, and fellow contributors. The more people who are aware of this issue, the stronger the message that respecting workers' right to organize and maintaining trust within the Wikimedia movement matter to all of us.
In solidarity! - Nemoralis.[1]: https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2026/07/27/statement-cwa-recognition-request/
[2]: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Questions_for_Bernadette_Meehan_regarding_the_WMF%27s_recognition_of_Wiki_Works_United.webm
[3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Village_pump_(WMF)#Recent_questions_about_the_Foundation_and_US_unionization_request
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