Workers’ rights groups from around the state gathered on the steps of the Capitol Wednesday afternoon to urge legislators to pay more attention to workers and their needs.

The event, organized by the United Campus Workers, a union for employees of Tennessee’s public colleges and universities, drew more than 100 people for a rally that concluded with a march to deliver a letter to Gov. Bill Haslam’s office.

“We have come together to call upon our elected leaders to change your current, off-the-rails trajectory and make the interests of Tennessee working people your top priority,” the letter reads. “Our coalition's response is simple: put the people first.”

Speakers at the rally echoed the letter’s complaints about “elite interests” influencing education and labor. Among the speakers were state Rep. Gloria Johnson, D-Knoxville, and Ed Hunter, a worker at the Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga who supported bringing union representation to the factory.

Johnson, a Knox County schoolteacher, mentioned vouchers and charter schools as examples of tax dollars being taken from public schools and given to private companies.

“We’ve got a commissioner of education who doesn’t have a lot of experience in the classroom,” said Johnson, “they have taken away a teacher’s seat at the table.”

Hunter spoke about last month’s vote by workers on whether to allow representation from the United Auto Workers in Chattanooga’s VW plant, saying that officials, including U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, tried to sway the vote.

“We had three days of voting, and in those three days we were bombarded by comments from our elected officials,” said Hunter.

Corker, just before the vote, suggested publicly that if workers at the plant in his home town rejected representation by the UAW, the company would announce that it would build a new product at the plant.

“We still do not have that second product,” Hunter said.