Organized Labor

By Doug Perry
Organized Labor

Those of us who traveled to Washington DC early this month to attend the Building Trades Legislative conference found that the burning question in Congress and on the union legislative agenda was immigration. On Tuesday, Senator John McCain was roundly booed when he addressed the legislative conference and presented a synopsis of the immigration bill being debated in the Senate. Many building trades leaders are opposed to the guest worker program. At one point, he offered to terminate his remarks and leave. Compared to the bill passed by the House of Representatives in December of last year, the Senate Bill is probably the most realistic, and certainly more considerate of immigrant rights.

Immigrant groups have argued that illegals take jobs that are not filled by U.S. citizens especially in agriculture and in lower paying positions in retailing and the service industry. Undoubtedly many immigrants hold down steady jobs, send their children to school, and become stable, taxpaying citizens. They contribute to our economic base.

The more draconian House bill proposed to build a 700- mile concrete wall along the U.S. Mexican border, and to make illegal immigration a felony. The Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, and Bill Frist, the Senate Majority leader announced on April 12th the proposal to make illegals felons would be removed. The House bill is sponsored by James Sensenbrenner, a Republican from Wisconsin, and has the backing of many of the more conservative members in the House who want to see the border sealed off. The bill is quite punitive, and among other things would make it a crime to provide food or assistance to illegals. Conservatives are undoubtedly concerned with issues of homeland security, and talk about the ease with which terrorists can now enter the U.S. Provisions in the legislation would result in the deportation of hundreds of thousands of illegals, many with children that were born in the United States. Moreover, even the Senate bill would require repatriation of illegals that have been here less than two years.

The Senate bill, sponsored by John McCain and Edward Kennedy with the support of Arlen Spector of the Senate Judiciary Committee, is certainly more considerate of immigrant needs. The legislation would provide a road to citizenship for the 11-12 million illegal immigrants now in the U.S. and would institute a guest worker program for roughly 400,000 workers annually. Undocumented workers without a criminal record would be able to work toward citizenship over a 6-year period by remaining employed, paying back taxes, and learning the English language. The Building Trades Department has asked that the new guest worker visa program known officially as H-2C should require that employers advertise for American workers to fill jobs before hiring foreign workers and that employers be required to also pay the prevailing wage.

However, after Bill Frist the Republican majority leader of the Senate had announced a compromise to pass the bill, the agreement collapsed in bi-partisan bickering. Republicans accused the Democrats of scuttling the bill to highlight the anti-immigrant provisions of the House legislation and Democrats complained of Republican efforts to weaken the bill through amendments. It would seem reasonable to hold both parties responsible for not working out a compromise on legislation that is sorely needed and that could well prevent social violence in the coming weeks and months.

When California Senator Barbara Boxer met with the California delegation she commented on the failure of the Martinez-Hagel and Specter compromises in the Senate. She notes that, “The Martinez-Hegel compromise would have provided increased border security and a path to legality for millions of undocumented workers...living in the shadows.”

Both bills would increase surveillance along the border for reasons of national security and would require new documentation by employers. The conservatives are generally opposed to a general amnesty for undocumented workers but support the guest worker program for their business constituents.

Protesters called for a National Day of Action in cities across the country on April 9th and 10th, and over a million people marched in demonstrations across the U.S. According to the New York Times some 500,000 people marched in Dallas; 400,000 in Washington DC; 50,000 in Atlanta; 20,000 in San Diego; 7,000 in Miami; 5,000 in San Francisco; and roughly 4,000 in Birmingham and Boise, Idaho. Senator Edward Kennedy addressed the huge crowd on the Capital Mall speaking in both English and Spanish saying, “Gracias por demandar justicia para todos Los Immigrantes, or Thank you for demanding justice for all immigrants.” Union Considerations.

Our construction unions have been directly affected by immigration issues. Many unions in the San Francisco Bay Area have large contingents of immigrant workers, both legal and undocumented. Hispanic workers even comprise a majority of the members in some locals.

Undocumented workers present union organizers with special problems. It has been well established that many unscrupulous non-union employers in construction are exploiting the undocumented worker. Companies in the underground economy often pay less than the prevailing wage, pay in cash to avoid payroll taxes, work the employees overtime without pay, fail to provide safe working conditions, and do not provide health care or pension benefits. Union construction workers also worry that the large undocumented workforce puts pressure on the union prevailing wage, and results in lower wages in the industry as a whole. The contractor that underpays his workers can bid on contracts against legitimate companies upsetting the even playing field.

Attempts to organize these workers often fail. The illegal worker often fears deportation or loss of employment if the workplace becomes unionized. Many illegals choose not to participate when even minimal documentation is required, such as the possession of a valid social security card or drivers license.

The unions generally support amnesty for illegal immigrants as the only practical alternative and are inclined to support the new Senate bill. The construction unions also support the stronger enforcement of labor law for the protection of all workers with monitoring of employer payrolls by workplace compliance officers such as those used by the San Francisco Office of Labor Standards and the State Department of Industrial Relations.

Dan Smith of Roofers Local 95 has looked at some of these issues in a research paper he published back in July 2001. Dan focused on the problems that unions have encountered in organizing undocumented workers. He reviewed the recent history of federal legislation beginning with the Bracero Program in 1951 and the Immigration Reform Act of 1986, passed during the Reagan administration, with it’s widespread amnesty for an estimated three million illegals. To underline the powerlessness of illegals he cites a decision by the NLRB in 2002 which found that, “a person is not entitled to back pay, even when the NLRB finds the employer violated the law in terminating the employee, if the person is an illegal alien.” In other words according to the federal bureaucracy an illegal has no legal right to be paid for his work.

Dan also conducted a survey of Local 95 members to determine how many were undocumented. While only 30% of the questionnaire were returned, the results still provide some indication of the status of illegal workers. He found that roughly 30% were undocumented and that another 16% were legal non-citizens. Looking at just the undocumented, 97% were from Mexico, 73% filed tax returns and 37% had worked under more than one name and or social security number. Of those who reported being cheated on the job, 40% worked for cash without paying taxes, 53% were cheated out of work hours or pay and as would be expected, 97% did not collect state unemployment when out of work. While it is difficult to generalize on the basis of this limited survey the work does provide insight into the extent of abuse of illegal workers.