Swift Meat Veterans For Justice
posted at 7:55 pm on December 24, 2006 by see-dubya
It’s pretty rare to see Michelle, on the one hand, and the Wall Street Journal editors, on the other, agree on matters of immigration policy. Yet both seem convinced that the recent raids on the Swift & Company meat-packing plants were nothing but a cheap political stunt. You know, just pandering to the base.
To which I say, yes! Pander to me more!
Sure, it was only a drop in the bucket, and Swift wasn’t charged with anything. But even if the raid was only supposed to be a political stunt it’s now snowballed beyond that. Trial lawyers representing former Swift employees are churning up a $23 million lawsuit against Swift:
“These plaintiffs are … victims in a longstanding scheme by Swift to depress and artificially lower the wages of its workers by knowingly hiring illegal workers,” said their attorney, Angel Reyes. “By lessening its labor costs and increasing its profits, Swift has severely damaged the potential earnings and livelihood of these hardworking men and women.”…
“When the Swift plant opened in Cactus, wages were approximately $20 (euro15.27) an hour,” said another plaintiffs attorney, Michael Haygood. “Now, the average wage is approximately $12 (euro9.16) to $13 (euro9.93) an hour. Illegal immigration has fueled this depression in wages.”
This is one to watch, and the lawsuit means the raid was actually much more significant than it first appeared to be. If this sort of suit is viable, the risk of similar lawsuits might begin to offset the savings of hiring illegal workers. The plaintiffs say Swift “looked the other way”, Swift says they never “knowingly” hired illegal immigrants. Any lawyer types out there care to guess what the relevant standard would be, and what the plaintiffs would have to prove?
Blowback
Note from Hot Air management: This section is for comments from Hot Air's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that Hot Air management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment just because we let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with our terms of use may lose their posting privilege.
Trackbacks/Pings
Trackback URL
Comments
Hmmmmm……
Lonevoice on December 24, 2006 at 8:27 PM
I think Swift wanted to rid themselves of their illegal labor and asked ICE to do the job for them. I’ve heard that they were advertising for workers on the radio, English speaking radio stations, for weeks prior to the raid. Obviously ICE couldn’t say no even if they wanted to.
A couple of months ago there was this news. Maybe Swift wanted to cut their losses.
The most important part of every one of those amnesty bills was the amnesty for employers part which was going to protect the companies/political contributors from these kinds of lawsuits. Now that the genie is out of the bottle, there is no way the Democrats –those trusted friends of the working class — can get away with shielding business owners from wronged employees.
There is another kind of prospective plaintiff that we haven’t heard from yet and it is the law abiding company or contractor who had their profits lowered by having to compete with the product and service prices ( and for contractors, the job bids ) against the outlaw companies.
Perchant on December 24, 2006 at 9:34 PM
I’m not a lawyer, but I was working in a management position when the I-9 form was created and imposed upon employers. At the last job where I was responsible for such things, I would make photocopies of the documents submitted by new employees, and keep them with the I-9 forms, even though that isn’t required by the law. That was a policy decision I made to substantiate the company’s good faith efforts to avoid hiring illegals.
I have every reason to believe that Swift enacted a similar policy. I’m guessing that none of those documents sink to the level of Rather forgeries. They don’t have to. There is a thriving business creating documents like drivers’ licenses that even state troopers wouldn’t be able to tell are fakes.
For Swift to require anything more than the law requires would have opened them to charges of racial discrimination against People of Color with Funny Accents. They probably can’t lose this one.
The only way to get a handle on the fake documents is via a system wherein an employer can, in real time, go online to verify that “John Q. Public” really does have {SS|Green Card} number X on record with the relevant agency; and the state agency that issued the identity document to confirm that driver license Y shows that name, hair/eye color, height, weight, and show the digital picture from the identity document for comparison with the proffered card.
Or we could just get a microchip implanted in our foreheads and/or our right hands.
The Monster on December 24, 2006 at 9:53 PM
actually, in a episode of “Sliders” & in the movie “Demolition Man” they did plant chips into the human body.
Starblazer on December 24, 2006 at 10:13 PM
correction, in a episode of “Sliders” & in the movie “Demolition Man” they did plant a microchip in the arms of the characters.
Starblazer on December 24, 2006 at 10:16 PM
correction II – they did plant a microchip in the arm of the characters from an episode of “Sliders” & Stallone’s character in “Demolition Man”
Starblazer on December 24, 2006 at 10:18 PM
I wouldn’t think the plaintiff’s would have to prove knowing employment of illegal aliens. And there’s an easy way to prove a knowing violation anyway: there are certain procedures that have to be followed and certain records that have to be kept in the hiring of workers. If Swift can’t produce the records for these workers or produce proof of compliance with procedures during discovery, it would be a pretty strong inference that they knew what they were doing when they hired these illegal aliens.
Mark V. on December 24, 2006 at 10:57 PM
Before the ex employees and their lawyers became involved (which is very cool), the tear jerking blitz machine was already in overdrive.
Every open borders, illegal migrant advocate group is demanding a moratorium on workplace enforcement.
What a great opportunity to blast away at the heartless law enforcement crowd this has been.
Amnesty through a worker program is being boosted back onto the front burner.
What we see as simple and proper law enforcement has been portrayed as brutal hate filled racism.
Sounds like Islamic psych media propaganda, if we do nothing, it’s over by simple demographics, if we dare enforce, it’s over by reactionary policy lawmaking.
I wonder, would the Israelis ask…now, how do you guys like it?
What should our next move be?
Speakup on December 24, 2006 at 11:50 PM
You nailed it, there is a new victim in town and this one is a real victim; victimized, in part, by yesterday’s victim.
The courts need to be flooded with this type of lawsuit. It will force an honest discussion about the economics of illegal labor. There is so much dishonesty now that the Wall Street Journal is actually claiming in print that there are job shortages for jobs that have seen wages decrease substantially. That hasn’t happened since the great cotton picker shortage 200 years ago…down south there.
Perchant on December 25, 2006 at 12:47 AM
The more dirty it gets to hire illegals, the more companies will stay away from them. The illegal alien activists are only adding to it an making illegals less desireable to hire.
Theworldisnotenough on December 25, 2006 at 4:45 AM
I question the timing !
DoctorDentons on December 25, 2006 at 6:26 AM
This whole development is great news, and a microcosm of what’s been going on with meat-packing/cutting (and other high-paying) jobs in general, giving way to “new” less-qualified jobs paying 1/3 or 1/4 of what they used to, and on-the-job self-inflicted injuries by incompetents skyrocketing.
I’ve wondered that myself. For one, showing the sharp decline of wages in the meat-packing business from >$18/hr to
RD on December 25, 2006 at 6:33 AM
… less than $6/hr with no sharp decrease in demand for meat – and the gradual replacement of long-time workers by workers who don’t speak English (hint?) – might build a case that owners/managers must have known they were hiring illegals. Just a logical argument, not necessarily a legal one :-)
RD on December 25, 2006 at 6:35 AM
The meat-packing example is such a textbook case because experts generally agree that in the “good old days”, before the tacit approval of illegal labor, there was a nexus of high wages, on-the-job expertise and efficiency that more than paid for itself in terms of higher productivity, better communication, less injuries, etc. By the same token, there’s widespread agreement that in chasing the almighty dollar, the industry has destroyed an indigenous professional trade/industry AND reduced profitability, successfully driving down wages but driving down productivity even more.
It would be great to see this one resolved in favor of the “good guys”. It’s even possible that many of the meat-packing companies would prefer in their heart of hearts, if they could, to snap their fingers and have everything go back to the way it was. Doubtful they can, though. And if they tried, would their ex-employees forgive them and “take them back”?
RD on December 25, 2006 at 6:43 AM
Everytime I hear that they want to give illegals or “guest workers” driver’s licenses I want to scream. Let’s flood another market with cheap labor and see the wages go into the toilet and have it become another job “Americans won’t do.”
EF on December 25, 2006 at 9:04 AM
Pandering is good. Esp when it snow balls
heh.
One Angry Christian on December 25, 2006 at 9:40 AM
We just need to take all the fun out of hiring foreigners here illegally.
Mojave Mark on December 25, 2006 at 10:43 AM
A trial balloon by the administration to see how these policies pan out by the people and corporate?
If we yell “hell yes, we want more” than maybe there is hope for this administration to take illegal immigration serious.
right2bright on December 25, 2006 at 11:01 AM
I really hope I don’t hear someone start the “jobs Americans won’t do” crap in person. I don’t think I’d be able to stop myself from administering a lecture about what is cause–availability of cheap illegal labor–and effect, i.e., lowering wages to a level citizens aren’t that interested in.
Such a stupid lie to claim it’s the other way around.
Okay, back to enjoying Christmas with the kids…
MamaAJ on December 25, 2006 at 11:45 AM
So they were doing the work legal immigrants and U.S. citizens will do, but not for that lower wage. Whenever illegal immigrant advocates in the Hispanic community or business owners trots out this canard, it is easy to dispel the myth of “jobs that Americans won’t do”–we simply won’t do them for a lower price. Heck, that is the whole point behind labor unions in the first place, protection of wages.
Faced with high labor costs, businesses end up sending jobs overseas, the dreaded “outsourcing” that liberals and unions despise. With cheap labor available elsewhere–and knowing that American job-seekers will refuse to accept a lower salary for the same work–the result is to move the job to the lower labor per unit cost area. Or in Swift’s case, import the cheaper labor here, by allegedly knowingly employing illegal immigrants who are more than willing to accept marginal wages that Americans won’t–or can’t–accept. The legal immigrants and U.S. citizens most affected by this influx of cheap, illegal labor are Hispanics.
This is why amnesty will fail. The newly legalized citizens and those with work permits will be able to demand higher wages as the result in the change of their legal status–thus necessitating even more illegal immigration to maintain the normative depressed wages. Legal Hispanic immigrants and U.S. citizens displaced by more illegal immigrants. Seems like a logical solution to me.
elpresidente on December 25, 2006 at 3:20 PM
“Because there are jobs that some Americans just won’t do–like enforcing immigration laws.” – Debbie Schlussel
Just as I noted in the other thread, illegal aliens cause everybody’s wages to go down.
It’s nice to see American workers going after companies who hire illegals by suing them. And I say that not only as a lawyer’s husband.
Frankly, Swift and the other companies who hire illegals won’t have a leg to stand on when it comes to trial. By being in violation of the law by hiring illegals — the large number of them is prima facia evidence that it was with knowledge — I think the only question will be is how large the damages against Swift will be or how quickly Swift offers a settlement in order to keep the plaintif’s lawyers OUT of their personnel records.
The question will be what happens in the future. I look for an attempt by business to go to Congress and the state legislatures to OUTLAW such suits in the future as “frivolous” or “unnecessary.” Just as big business has moved to limit product liability and medical malpractice damages by caps on recovery or the NRA moving to prevent the Brady gun grabbers from suing gun makers into oblivion.
Using lawsuits to stop companies from hiring illegals would be different from either of these examples, because hiring illegals is itself a specific violation of the law.
But I expect them to try anyway, by using either liability caps and/or preemptive legislation to outlaw employee lawsuits against companies by twiddling the labor relations acts.
Follow the money. Watch the Democrats’ financial coffers swell as the pro-business lobby tries to kill this practice.
georgej on December 25, 2006 at 6:31 PM
I say ” go after the rest of the meat industry, as Swift is only one company”. Hormel perhaps?
And the homebuilding industry. Anyone having problems with lack of qulity in their new homes due to cheap,unskilled labor??
Lots of opportunities out there to save the jobs the American worker is “Not Allowed To Do” by greedy employers.
gary on December 26, 2006 at 6:21 AM
Don’t forget about the Tyson Foods Packaging Plants. I am certain that thousands of jobs could be opened up to American citizens there.
DannoJyd on December 26, 2006 at 2:02 PM
What a Socialist tool. “Oh no, the evil company hired the cheapest laborers available! They’re only in it for the profits!” Oh, the horrors of capitalism and a free labor market. Woe upon the “hardworking men and women” (read: employees that cost more per unit of production… so less hardworking).
Is this the sort of things that Conservatives cheer now? Is anti-capitalism rhetoric okay as long as it cheers for nativism? What’s next, axing the First Amendment in order to fight terrorism? Oh wait…
Mark Jaquith on December 31, 2006 at 3:46 AM