"Chipotle Firings: One Story of a Broken Immigration System "

[bobbolink]

"Just over one month ago, a few dozen fired employees demonstrated outside a Chipotle one block from Sojourners' office. The employees reported that they were taken to the back of the store during their 30-minute break and were dismissed without warning. On their way out of the restaurant they saw their replacements already at work. Chipotle fired 40 employees throughout the D.C. area because of questions regarding their immigration status. Workers reported that Chipotle still has not paid nearly $21,000 in wages.

"Stories like this occur day after day across the country. Our immigration system is broken. The status quo is not acceptable. It tears apart families, hurts businesses, and divides communities.


"This month, Sojourners and Christians for Comprehensive Immigration Reform are featuring "The Stories of Immigration" blog series. We are highlighting stories, songs, and interviews with immigrants and immigrant advocates as a way to offer a behind-the-scenes look at the lives of immigrants and the broken immigration system here in the United States."

http://blog.sojo.net/2011/05/10/the-education-of-an-unlikely-immigrant-advocate/

[LiberalLoner]

1. K&R n/t

[PDJane]

2. Those unpaid workers are the tip of the iceberg.

It's really, really easy to ignore workers who are owed wages if they aren't documented...even if they are documented, they're easy to intimidate.

Sometimes I despise people.

[bobbolink]

6. You are absolutely right, and the stories in the blogs cover much more.

I hope you will read them.

[msanthrope]

9. Well, an employer can't pay back wages to a person without a legal social security number.

There's a problem--people may be owed back wages, but unless they can verify that the social security number that they are using is legal--and their's--who does the employer pay?

Obviously, there will have to be a NLRB action to recover wages--I hope the workers get what they worked for, but I'm not surprised that Chipotle hasn't been handing out checks without verification.

[Omaha Steve]

13. The NLRB only deals with union issues

The Wage & Hour Division of the US Labor Dept. will sort this out. There are cases that have gone through the court for precedent. The US Fair Labor Act (1938) states wages earned must be paid on a timely basis by the employer. Since some of these workers had over 10 years on the job, it is obvious the company should have known. Why didn't a routine audit pop this up for the company? Because the company knew is an accepted legal argument. The workers will get paid plus a penalty!

http://www.dol.gov/whd/flsa/

The full amended Labor Act: http://www.osha.gov/pls/epub/wageindex.download?p_file=F15794/FairLaborStandAct.pdf

[Omaha Steve]

3. K #6

So glad to see follow up on this.

This story was covered when it happened in the Labor Forum: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=367

[bobbolink]

7. Sojo is doing a bang of a "follow up". This is the theme of this month's blog series.

You may be interested in reading the rest of the series:

http://blog.sojo.net/2011/05/19/chipotle-firings-one-story-of-a-broken-immigration-system/

[Egnever]

4. This is a BS story

Chipolte was targeted by INS for an imigrant worker audit. They were forced to fire these people by the federal government. Making Chipolte out to be some uncaring evil company is misdirected anger at its finest.

Chipotle chain targeted for federal immigration audits
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2011/02/chipotle-chain-targeted-federal-immigration-audits.html

They screwed up as a company by not requiring better documentation in the first place when hiring these workers but when they were forced to show documentation and these workers could not they had no choice but to fire them as the federal government was going after them.

Chipolte is one of the better companies as far as fast food goes here in Nevada they are constantly doing charity drives for one cause or another. Every year here they have a day where they let teachers and their families eat for free. I dont know of any other fast food chain that gives so much back to their local communities.

Outrage is appropriate at times but in this case its totally misplaced.

[dflprincess]

5. Whether or not the workers had documentation, Chipolte still owes them wages

and I find it hard to believe that the company merely "screwed up" not asking for better documentation in the first place. They knew exactly what they were doing when these workers were hired.

[msanthrope]

8. It's pretty easy to scam the E-Verify system on the front end, tough to keep it up.

All you need is a social security number, and some pretty easily photoshopped other pieces of id--NONE of which need to be a picture id, like a driver's license...in fact, lots of poor people don't have state-issued photo id. That's why these new voter-id laws affect the poor so much.

So, the employer puts the social security number into E-verify, and it pops back that it is a 'legal' number.

It might take a few tax-paying quarters, then, for the system to notice that the same social security number used in Washington DC is being used in Modesto, CA. And in Puerto Rico, or, New Mexico, where it originated.

It's not tough to GET a job on E-Verify. It's tough to KEEP one.

[dflprincess]

16. Not all employers are required to use e-verify

only government contractors and employers located in a few states. When a employer uses e-verify not only do they find out if the SS# is valid, they also find out if the name the employee gave them matches the name the government shows is attached to the number.

The law only requires that employers collect I-9 forms for all employees. These forms are not sent to any government agency but kept on file by the employer for up to 3 years after an employee has left the job in case of an I-9 audit. Not using e-verify gives an employer plausible deniability should they find themselves faced with an I-9 audit.

[Egnever]

10. Thats cause it fits your narrative

the one that says undocumented workers are the victim and American corporations are all out to take advantage of them.

Like I said in the post above this is not the evil corporation you want to fit your narrative.

For one thing they give back to the community all the time but beyond that they also support sustainably raised food and local farmers willing to grow organically. They go out of their way to do everything possible to ensure their products are made from meat that has no hormones or antiobiotics and if they cant get their hands on it they have a notification in the store that they are using a substitute and will return to their normal meat products as soon as they are available.

This is the sort of company we as Dems should be going out of our way to support and encourage and making up claims against them based on the word of employees who lied about their credentials in the first place is disgusting IMHO and counter productive to most of thew things we claim to believe in here.

Do some research on them yourself and I think you will find these guys are not mcdonalds or your typical fast food chain.

The OP article is BS.

[Omaha Steve]

15. Chipolte is franchised and owned locally

Good owners in parts of Nevada doesn't equal good owners in other locations. From several things I've read, these owners suck swamp water for several reasons.

[kelly1mm]

11. Except for not paying back wages, what is the problem? The system worked

exactly as designed. The workers could not prove their legal status and thus were let go as required by federal law.

[leftstreet]

12. What am I missing? Nothing at your link about Chipotle firings

:shrug:

[MikeW]

14. misleading story ... THIS IS THE SYSTEM WORKING as it should

Wages are another story.