EL CENTRAL Hispanic News, Thursday, December 21, 2006
Detroit Activists Protest
Raids on Immigrants at Swift & Co. Plants
Special Report to El Central by Dr.
José Cuello
On Friday morning, December 15, 2006, approximately thirty activists
joined a protest against the raids carried out by the Bureau of
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (BICE) on Tuesday, December 12 at
six Swift & Co. meat-packing plants in six states.
The Detroit protest in front of the Office of the Department of
Homeland Security (DHS) at Jefferson and Mt. Elliott was organized by
Latinos United/Unidos of Michigan (LU/UM), the Centro Obrero/Workers'
Center of Detroit, and the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC) of
Ohio.
Members of Workers World in Detroit, the Michigan Welfare Rights
Organization, SEMCOSH, The Washtenaw Worker Center in Ypsilanti-Ann
Arbor, and students from U of M and WSU also participated.
Centro Obrero Director, Elena Herrada, condemned the double
victimization of workers through employer exploitation and government
terrorism.
Herrada, board member of the Michigan Coalition of Human Rights (MCHR),
called for the adherence to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations on December 10,
1948. http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html
Marian Kramer of the Michigan Welfare Rights Organization called the
naming of the DHS building after Rosa Parks a deliberate insult to
everything Ms. Parks's life and memory represents.
The "memorial" to Rosa Parks follows an apparent mean-spirited and
derisive pattern of symbolism chosen by officials of the former
Department of Immigration and Naturalization Services (INS).
They renamed their agency "BICE", and commonly drop the "B" from its
acronym to identify it as ICE.
Rosendo Delgado, Coordinator of LU/UM, said he believes that December
12 was chosen by BICE because it is the feast day of the Virgin of
Guadalupe, the patron saint of Mexico, and one of the holiest days in
the workers' calendar.
A calloused cowboy mentality pervades the largest armed law enforcement
agency in the nation. The raids were the result of a ten-month
investigation called "Operation Wagon Train."
The demonstration in front of the BICE headquarters protested the
latest military attack by the Bush administration in its efforts to
beat down unauthorized immigrant workers, terrorize their families, and
inflict pain on human being who are seen as only pawns in the chaotic,
contradictory political game being played over our nation's immigration
policies.
A total of 1,282 workers were arrested in early morning raids on
December 12 by 1,000 BICE agents at Swift & Co. beef and pork
processing plants in Greeley, Colorado, Grand Island, Nebraska, Cactus,
Texas, Hyrum, Utah, Marshalltown, Iowa, and Worthington, Minnesota.
The raids represent the largest known coordinated enforcement of
immigration laws against a single company. They rounded up almost 10
percent of the approximately 13,500 Swift & Co. employees at the
plants.
Workers were hauled away in vans to detention centers in bordering
states out of reach of their families and other resources in their
local communities.
Dozens of children were left abandoned in schools when their parents
were taken away.
In a new tactic, BICE charged up to sixty five (5 percent) of the 1,282
workers arrested with identity theft for using real social security
numbers belonging to American citizens, instead of false numbers.
170 workers were charge with using false identities.
400 other workers quit before the raids took place when Swift & Co.
essentially warned the workers by carrying out its own internal
investigation. Swift had known for months about the coming raid
and tried unsuccessfully to get a court order to prevent them.
Spokespersons for The United Food and Commercial Workers International
Union (UFCW) called the raids an unconstitutional violation of workers'
rights and filed injunction in attempts to obtain the release of
workers. It represents 10,000 workers at five Swift & Co.
plants.
The chair of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' committee on
migration, Bishop Gerald R. Barnes, criticized the traumatic impact of
the raids of families and called for a humane comprehensive reform of
immigration laws.
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the aim of the raids
was to scare undocumented workers from seeking jobs in the United
States. He said the raids would continue, and that vendors of
fraudulent documents were also being targeted.
He called for congressional approval of a guest worker to reduce
illegal immigration.
Swift & Co. has been cooperating since 1997 with a government
program called Basic Pilot to identify false social security numbers.
Chertoff called for congressional approval for Homeland Security to
access Social Security Administration records to identify the multiple
workers who are using the same stolen SS number.
Supporters of tighter immigration controls called the raids a ploy to
get the guest worker program through Congress, while supporters of
immigrant workers' rights labeled the raids government-sponsored
terrorism.
The raids have upset Swift & Co. officials who believed that their
cooperation with the Basic Pilot program protected them from
raids. Swift & Co. is the world's second-largest meat
processing company after Tyson Foods Inc. Tyson plant managers have
been accused by TIME Magazine of actively recruiting undocumented
workers.
Other labor-intensive businesses, like agricultural, service,
hospitality, landscaping, construction, fast food, and assembly have
become dependent on unauthorized immigrant workers and are now
threatened by the new BICE strategy.
The 13,000 workers arrested in the raids represent less than 0.002
percent of the seven million estimated unauthorized immigrant workers
who support an additional 4.5 million family members. Union
membership declined from approximately 45% to 21% by the mid-1980s.
The Meatpacking industry has led the way for the U.S. companies in
crushing union strength and lowering wages, a development most recently
seen in the auto industry. Meatpacking wage were approximately
15% higher than the manufacturing sector in the 1970s. Now they
are 25% below the norm. Wages start at $11.50 an hour with
benefits. Turnover in the workforce is about 33%.
Ex-workers are suing Swift for hiring undocumented workers to lower
wages. The auto industry has proven you can crush labor without
immigrants.
But it helps to have immigrants to divide the workers against each
other. About 10% of the Swift and Co. workforce at the six plants
was arrested. As much as 40% could ultimately be affected.
A New York Times Editorial (December 18, 2006) concluded that the
current system of enforcement is nothing more than a sham for providing
cheap, illegal and terrorized labor to employers.
Some details for this report were drawn from the Associated Press, the
New York Times, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times.
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