Jeff's Desk

IMMIGRATION

Many UFCW members are asking why our union is fighting for the on-the-job rights of immigrants and pushing for a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. Why should our union fight for “illegals”?

The UFCW does not hire illegal or undocumented workers. Companies do. But unions have a legal responsibility to represent people at work once they’re hired, regardless of their status. Our role, and the reason we represent all workers, is to ensure that people who live and work in America are rewarded for their work with decent benefits and fair wages so that people can support their families and live the American Dream. It’s about being able to live a decent life, a secure retirement, being able to take a nice vacation, and helping your kids go to college.

But these days, working people and their unions have to fight harder than ever just to achieve the American Dream. Employers are going to unscrupulous lengths to increase their profits. When they can’t move their operations overseas to take advantage of weak labor laws and poverty wages, they’re breaking labor laws, and driving down wages and benefits in this country. These employers exploit our immigration system for profit. They recruit and lure undocumented immigrants to this country with the purpose of creating a disposable labor pool. Employers get away with ignoring labor laws and health and safety standards, and threatening to turn them in to immigration officials if they stand up for their rights.

Our laws say the employers must verify that workers are legal to work. But big corporations have no incentive to follow the law, and there are no meaningful consequences when they don’t.

Immigration doesn’t happen without causes. Globalization means that corporations and capital can cross borders freely - but workers and their families can be left behind with nothing. That’s just what happened to millions of American workers when their companies picked up and went overseas. Corporations lobbied for hurtful trade policies, like NAFTA, that give business free reign - but give workers no protections. NAFTA caused massive job losses for Americans - but it also drove millions of Mexicans into poverty - fueling the labor flight into the U.S.

Hundreds of thousands of immigrants are literally forced to come here to support their families, and are subsequently exploited and abused. Then corporations claim that immigrants are doing jobs that American’s won’t do - and support politicians who toe that line. In turn, television pundits claim that immigrants steal or destroy good paying American jobs.

This creates a culture in which we being to blame the immigrants themselves - rather than corporations and politicians who created the situation. We begin to believe that because immigrants are “illegal” they’re not entitled to any rights at all. We begin to believe that immigrants come here to collect welfare, that they don’t pay taxes, drain the economy and local resources - all without having the common courtesy to learn English.

These claims are false, if not racist and intolerant. Immigrants don’t drive down wages or destroy American jobs. Companies do. But companies and many of our politicians want us to believe the opposite. The same corporations that lobbied for NAFTA and who import immigrant workers are counting on Americans to blame immigrants. They’re counting on Americans to support immigration “reform” that isn’t good for immigrants or Americans - but for companies.

American companies, many of our politicians, and even President Bush want us to support guestworker programs that, in essence, continue the exploitation and erosion of good jobs that is already going on. Guestworker programs let employers turn good, permanent, full-time jobs that pay the bills into temporary go-nowhere jobs. They chain immigrants to the employers that recruited them, leave them vulnerable to exploitation, and leave Americans to fend for themselves.

Guestworker programs aren’t real immigration reform - it’s just another boon for big business.  Guestworker programs let companies fire workers who speak out about unsafe working conditions, or who try to organize a union - and that effects everyone who lives and works in America. We can’t let this happen and then be surprised later when that so-called reform has unintended consequences. One only has to look at NAFTA, CAFTA, and the effects of the U.S. Trade Policy, globalization, and outsourcing to realize that, eventually, the chickens come home to roost.

The answer isn’t to deport immigrant workers, or to criminalize them, to build a border fence, to raid workplaces, separate families, or put immigrants in jail. These piecemeal actions don’t confront the root causes of illegal immigration nor the corporate culture that exploits all workers. Terrorizing people who already exist on the economic margins doesn’t help immigrants or Americans. Rather, successful immigration reform must start with the idea that people who live and work in America should have the full range of rights and opportunities that America provides.

The UFCW supports immigrant workers because supporting all working people lies at the heart and soul of what it means to be a trade unionist. Of course, illegal immigration is wrong. But it’s a worse crime when corporations exploit workers. Profit-driven corporations created our immigration crisis - and it’s up to immigrant and American workers and the labor movement to come together to fix it.

In Unionism,

Jeff McDonald
Secretary-Treasurer
UFCW Local 555