Unionizing Is Catch-22 for Illegal Immigrants

Employers are increasingly fighting union campaigns by firing or threatening undocumented workers, thwarting labor organizers and defying the intent--if not the letter--of immigration law.

Complaints of retaliatory firings have climbed as unions aggressively recruit immigrants, considered crucial to rebuilding the U.S. labor movement, and as the fast-growing economy pulls in more unauthorized workers.

While difficult to measure, the apparent backlash is clear enough to prompt action from a number of federal agencies, including the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Immigration and Naturalization Service, which is seeking to reassure unions that it will back away from labor conflicts when possible.

Just last week, the EEOC announced a $72,000 settlement with a Minneapolis Holiday Inn Express, where nine undocumented workers were fired and arrested after a successful unionization drive.

It was the first settlement under a new policy announced by the commission in October extending protection to all workers, even those in the United States illegally. In reality, however, undocumented immigrants take greater risks because the government cannot force an employer to reinstate someone who is here illegally, even if fired unjustly.

“The fear is pervasive,” said Pamela Thomason, regional attorney for the EEOC in Los Angeles, “and rational.”

Labor is so concerned that the AFL-CIO, an umbrella organization representing 13 million workers, recently convened a task force on immigration laws that is expected to call for major reform as early as next month.

Central to the controversy is a 1986 federal law that criminalized the hiring of undocumented workers. The law was backed by labor, which at the time viewed illegal immigrants as potential strikebreakers and argued that employers should be punished for hiring them instead of U.S. citizens and other legal residents.

Since then, the proliferation of fake documents, along with weak enforcement and the complicity of some employers, has undercut the goal of reducing illegal immigration.

In fact, according to the INS, the illegal immigrant population has grown by about 275,000 a year since the law was enacted, and now stands at about 6 million.

Nearly half of the undocumented workers are believed to live in California, and are concentrated in certain low-wage sectors, including farm labor, janitorial services, hotel and restaurant work, and garment and other low-skilled assembly jobs. In some sectors, they may account for half the work force, researchers said.

Labor organizers said fear of firing or deportation is one reason wages have stagnated and union organizing drives have stalled in many of those sectors.

“When you have a group of workers who are undocumented and easily frightened, it is almost impossible to win,” said Joel Ochoa, an organizer with the International Assn. of Machinists, which earlier this month lost a hard-fought campaign to organize an immigrant work force at a wheel assembly plant in San Bernardino.

Being Fired After Voting for a Union

In the shadow world of illegal immigrants, stories of retaliatory firings spread quickly, and carry far more weight than the carefully worded assurances of federal agencies.

Take the case of Rodrigo Romero, a Vernon warehouse worker who was fired in October, one day after he voted to be represented by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.

Romero, 39, a native of Belize, was employed for seven years by La Curacao, a Los Angeles department store catering to recent immigrants. For the past four years, he ran the warehouse shipping department, earning $8.50 an hour.

He said supervisors had long known of his undocumented status. A file of correspondence held by Romero shows that La Curacao referred him to an immigration lawyer two years ago and lent him $1,000 for a longshot attempt to gain legal residency.

But during the union organizing campaign, Romero said, he was frequently reminded of his tenuous status and urged to vote against the Teamsters. He said he openly supported the union because many warehouse workers had not received raises in years and some lacked proper safety equipment.

The Teamsters won the secret ballot election. The next day, Romero was told he had been terminated. The reason: He could not produce valid immigration papers. La Curacao did not respond to numerous requests for comment.

Romero took his case to the National Labor Relations Board, which is investigating his and seven other terminations at La Curacao. Even if he prevails, however, the typical NLRB remedy of reinstatement is not available to him. The best he can hope for is a limited amount of back pay.

“It’s a difficult situation, and here in Los Angeles, it comes up with some frequency,” said NLRB spokesman James Small. “We try to balance the rights of employees with the need to acknowledge immigration laws. It isn’t easy. There’s been a lot of agonizing over this issue.”

Concern is not limited to California. As demographics shift in the nation’s blue-collar work force, the same tricky terrain is being navigated in union drives as distant as Minnesota, where an estimated 30,000 undocumented workers fill low-wage jobs.

Immigration status “has come up in every single organizing campaign we’ve had in the last three years,” said Jaye Rykunyk, secretary-treasurer of the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees International Union, Local 17, in Minneapolis.

“In a number of our hotels, we have lost entire departments. And it really has a chilling effect on an organizing drive. People understand very clearly [that] if you are involved in trying to bring in a union, you put your job in jeopardy.”

In a recent case that Rykunyk regarded as particularly egregious, pro-union housekeeping workers at a Minneapolis Holiday Inn Express were summoned to an office meeting and greeted by an INS agent. The agent, who had been called by an assistant hotel manager, determined that nine were illegal immigrants and arrested them.

Rykunyk bailed them out, then helped shepherd the workers through a federal complaint process that ended with the $72,000 settlement announced last week. This week, the workers asked for amnesty, but they are almost certain to be deported to Mexico.

The incident infuriated the union and embarrassed the INS, which had been touting a new enforcement strategy that targets bad employers--those who recruit or even smuggle illegal workers--and punishes them with hefty fines.

Gone are the days of sensational, tip-generated workplace raids, which have not significantly deterred illegal immigration and have the potential for dragging the INS into labor disputes. At least, one INS official said, that is the goal.

“We have operating instructions that very clearly say when a lead comes in, the local INS office needs to search out whether there is a potential to be misused, and that’s what did not happen in Minneapolis,” said Robert Bach, executive associate commissioner for policy and planning at the INS.

Bach said he is continuing to talk informally with the AFL-CIO to calm the waters. “There’s a real credibility issue here,” he conceded. “The INS has to prove that it is really committed to the new enforcement policy and can pull it off on the ground level.”

As an indication of the agency’s new direction, Bach pointed to a $1.9-million settlement with Filiberto’s, a Phoenix restaurant chain that admitted recruiting undocumented workers.

It was a record fine, and an exception to the rule. In the last five years, according to a Times analysis of INS data, about 4,000 employers were fined for knowingly hiring illegal immigrants. Nearly all of those fines were substantially reduced or forgiven altogether.

“The fact is that very little has been done to employers under this law,” said Lucas Guttentag, who directs the American Civil Liberties Union’s immigration project. “The focus has been overwhelmingly on workers. Instead of helping the work force, it’s only increased the level of exploitation.”

Active involvement by the INS in retaliatory firings is actually quite rare, labor activists said. Instead, many employers simply “review” an employee’s records and find them to be inadequate. The tactic is illegal--immigration documents can be inspected only at the time of hiring--but often effective.

“There are many stories of employers calling people in before a union vote to check their papers, even in cases where they helped them get over the border,” said Mike Garcia, president of the Service Employees International Union, Local 1877, which represents many immigrant janitors in Los Angeles.

“As long as everything’s quiet, these issues don’t get raised. But [firings are] always available. That’s the problem with the law. It’s become another weapon for the employer.”

Law Allegedly Used to Punish Workers

Garcia is among a group of labor activists pushing the AFL-CIO to recommend a repeal of the 1986 “employer sanctions” law on the grounds that it has been used to punish workers rather than employers. Instead, he said, the government should legalize undocumented workers and spend more to enforce wage and safety laws.

Not surprisingly, there is little consensus on the matter, within or outside labor.

“What really would serve labor’s interest is an effective verification system that would prevent employers from [hiring undocumented workers and] holding the prospect of termination over employees’ heads,” said Mark Krikorian, director of the Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington-based group that favors tighter immigration controls. “Otherwise what you have is an additional cudgel crooked employers have against their crooked employees.”

For Rodrigo Romero, the fired warehouse worker, no proposal offers much hope. After 10 years of living in Los Angeles, he can’t imagine returning to Belize. And yet three months after losing his job at La Curacao, he has not found a replacement.

“To tell the truth, I feel very disillusioned,” said Romero, who now does odd jobs in construction. “When I signed the union card, I told them a lot of people are going to be fired if we win. I just didn’t know I would be the first one.”