Tennessee Senator Bob Corker has blasted the United Auto Workers Union’s bid to organize employees at the Volkswagen AG assembly plant in Chattanooga, Tenn. in remarks also highly critical of the company’s German managers.

VW executives said last week in a letter to workers at the Chattanooga plant they are in talks with the UAW about the U.S. union’s bid to represent workers at the factory using an “innovative model,” which would be a milestone in the UAW’s long-running – and so far unsuccessful — effort to organize foreign-owned auto plants.

Corker told Reuters that VW executives at the Chattanooga plant were “forced” to sign the letter.

In a separate interview with the Associated Press, Corker said Volkswagen would become a “laughingstock” if it goes through with a deal to have the UAW represent workers at its Tennessee plant. Corker also said he was dismayed when VW last week sent a letter to employees regarding its discussion with the UAW about creating a German-style works council at the Chattanooga plant.

“For management to invite the UAW in is almost beyond belief,” Corker said. “They will become the object of many business school studies — and I’m a little worried they could become a laughingstock in many ways — if they inflict this wound,” the Republican Senator told the AP, adding he hoped VW would reverse course and not hold any kind of discussions with the UAW.

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Corker was leader of Tennessee’s campaign to coax Volkswagen to build its lone U.S. assembly plant in the city where he once served as mayor, and he said he hopes the company pulls back from its decision to engage in talks with the UAW.

“It’s still incomprehensible to me that they would be where they are,” he said. “I’m discouraged and I do hope they will pull back from this.”

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The UAW has spent more than two decades trying to get a foothold in the so-called “transplant” assembly lines run by foreign makers like Toyota, Honda, BMW and, most recently, Volkswagen.  Though they initially gained representation rights in three factories operated as joint ventures between U.S. and Japanese manufacturers, Mazda has pulled out of its partnership with Ford in a suburban Detroit plant, while both Toyota and General Motors abandoned their alliance plant near San Francisco. Only a Mitsubishi plant in Illinois, originally started in partnership with Chrysler, remains organized.

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The UAW current leadership has made organizing the transplants its top priority. And though it is struggling with an effort at Nissan’s Canton, Mississippi factory, the union appears to be moving forward in Chattanooga – in large part with help from VW’s powerful union in Germany which has a stake on the maker’s board.

“We’ve talked to management, and to me it’s beyond belief that they’ve allowed this to go that far and displayed this kind of naivety that the UAW is somehow different than they were years ago,” Sen. Corker said.

Labor representatives on VW’s supervisory board have said it is unfair for the company to deal with organized labor at every one of its major facilities around the world except for at its U.S. plant.

“The Volkswagen Group respects the employees’ right for an employee representation on plant level at all locations worldwide,” the letter from the plant managers said. “This certainly also applies to the Chattanooga plant.”

Corker said the Southeast would become less attractive to foreign automakers if the UAW gains a foothold, adding that he worries that Volkswagen would become less competitive if the UAW represents workers at the plant.

UAW representatives described Corker’s comments as “ludicrous” and said VW wants the works council because its other factories have been successful due to collaborative relationships between management and workers.

Corker and the UAW have been at odds since he demanded wage and benefit concessions for union workers as part of the government bailout of GM and Chrysler in 2009. Corker maintains that his role in the discussions helped the auto industry emerge from the economic crisis in stronger shape.