Fred Zuckerman has served for 20 years as the President of Teamsters Local 89 in Louisville, Kentucky. Under Zuckerman’s leadership, Local 89 has grown to over 16,000 members and has become one of the largest and most powerful Local Unions in the United States. Local 89 is home to the UPS Worldport Air Hub and the UPS Louisville Centennial Ground Hub and represents the largest number of UPS Teamsters in the world.
Zuckerman began his long and distinguished union career by helping organize Chemical Express in 1979 at Teamsters Local 988. He later moved to Kentucky and became a member of Teamsters Local 89 as a Carhauler at E&L Transport. Soon after Zuckerman became a shop floor steward, and in 1993 he became a business agent for Local 89.
In 1999, Zuckerman became President of Local 89, a position he has been re-elected to through seven terms. In 2005, he was elected to serve as President of Teamsters Joint Council 94, covering Kentucky, Indiana and West Virginia, and continues to serve in that position today.
In 2016, Zuckerman ran for General President of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, leading the Teamsters United slate against James P. Hoffa. In that election Teamsters United won the majority of votes from United States Teamsters, including landslide wins in the Central and Southern regions, leading to the election of six Teamsters United Regional Vice Presidents who now serve on the Teamsters General Executive Board. This would prove to be one of the closest elections in Teamsters history, with Hoffa only narrowly escaping defeat by 6,024 votes after the Canadian Teamsters ballots were counted.
In his time as President of Teamsters Local 89, Zuckerman has championed policies that have increased the benefits, wages and job security of thousands of hard-working Teamsters. Never one to back down from a fight, President Zuckerman has successfully guided the membership of Local 89 through battles that lesser leaders would have fled from. At UPS, Freight, Kroger Warehouse, Carhaul, IMI and many more “white paper” companies, President Zuckerman has stood and prevailed against attacks on his Teamster brothers and sisters.