Bush Administration Gives Wal-Mart a Pass on Multiple Violations of Labor Laws
By Steven Greenhouse
Published by The New York Times, March
19, 2005
Editor's Note: As the comments following this article point
out, this case is a great example of the dual standard of justice in America
that provides incentive for criminal corporations to flout laws
designed to protect us. The negotiated payment
by the Wal-Mart Corporation not only makes a joke of the U.S. Justice Dept.,
the amount is a joke for Wal-Mart -- equal to 20 minutes of income for the
company by our calculation. Investigation of alleged offenses in more than
twenty different states was dropped in exchage for Wal-Mart's check. This was
the second
time in weeks such a sweetheart deal has been offered to the company, a
major funder of Republicans.
Federal prosecutors and immigration officials announced yesterday that Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., had agreed to pay a record $11 million to settle accusations that it used hundreds of illegal immigrants to clean its stores.
Federal investigators said they had decided not to bring criminal charges against Wal-Mart, the nation's largest retailer, because it was cooperating and had pledged strong action to prevent future employment of illegal immigrants at its 3,600 stores in the United States.
The $11 million payment was four times larger than any other single payment to the government in an illegal immigrant employment case, federal officials said. Wal-Mart, which did not admit any wrongdoing in the settlement, had $288.2 billion in sales last year. The company's stock closed at $51.45 a share yesterday, down 88 cents.
The settlement grew out of enforcement actions in which 100 janitors who were illegal immigrants were arrested in 2001 at Wal-Mart stores in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Missouri and New York, and an additional 245 were arrested in October 2003 at 60 stores in 21 states. Soon after, Wal-Mart acknowledged receiving a letter saying it was the subject of a federal grand jury investigation in Pennsylvania.
Wal-Mart has said that its executives knew nothing about the employment of illegal immigrants before the raids and that the janitors were hired by contractors that Wal-Mart used to clean its stores late at night. Company officials said they used more than 100 contractors to clean more than 700 of its stores.
"We acknowledge that we should have had better safeguards in place to ensure that our contractors were hiring only legal workers," said Mona Williams, a Wal-Mart spokeswoman.
Wal-Mart reached the settlement two months after it began a publicity campaign to portray itself as a model employer, saying that it pays higher wages than most retailers. Wal-Mart, which has 1.2 million workers in the United States, has sought to improve its image after labor unions accused it of providing poor wages and benefits and after lawyers filed class-action lawsuits, accusing it of sexual discrimination and forcing employees to work unpaid hours off the clock.
In a statement from Washington, federal officials announced that 12 janitorial contractors that worked for Wal-Mart had agreed to forfeit $4 million to the government and to plead guilty to criminal charges of employing illegal immigrants.
Many of the immigrants said they generally worked from midnight until 8 a.m., seven nights a week, cleaning and waxing floors. They came from nearly 20 countries, including Mexico, Brazil, the Czech Republic, China, Poland and Russia.
Wal-Mart officials said the $11 million was not a fine, but a voluntary payment that would be used to help ensure compliance with immigration laws. Wal-Mart has said it has cut back its use of cleaning contractors.
Joseph Hansen, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, which has sought to unionize some Wal-Mart stores, said the record payment "should be a wake-up call to a corporation that has systematically bent and broken the law to increase their corporate coffers at the expense of the most vulnerable employees."
But Lilia Garcia, executive director of the Maintenance Cooperation Trust Fund, a group that monitors conditions for janitors, said the settlement was inadequate. "The $11 million really isn't that much when you consider this was going on in 21 states," Ms. Garcia said. "It was a real pattern and practice." She said that Wal-Mart was so huge that an $11 million penalty would hardly serve as a deterrent.
Wal-Mart continues to face a federal class-action lawsuit in New Jersey asserting that it and its contractors had conspired to violate racketeering laws. The lawsuit says that more than 10,000 illegal immigrant janitors were used at Wal-Mart stores and that they were virtually never paid time-and-a-half for overtime.
"It's outrageous that this could occur in the early 21st century," said James L. Linsey, the janitors' main lawyer in the case. "They generally worked seven nights a week, 364 days a year, and they were often locked in the stores. Now that the federal criminal investigation has been laid to rest, it's time for Wal-Mart to focus on the individuals who were systematically exploited and to consider what amount of reparations is appropriate."
Wal-Mart's lawyers have filed motions to dismiss the case, saying that the company knew nothing about the janitors' working conditions and that the independent contractors, and not Wal-Mart, were responsible for the janitors' treatment.
Ms. Williams said that Wal-Mart was cooperating fully with federal investigators because it was eager to improve working conditions for the janitors.
"We don't want these folks to be treated poorly," she said. "We're spending this money so that folks that do this can't get away with it."
The settlement permanently bars Wal-Mart from hiring illegal immigrants and directs it to establish within 18 months a mechanism to make sure that its contractors "are taking reasonable steps to comply with immigration laws."
In the settlement, Wal-Mart pledged to train all of its store managers over the next 18 months not to knowingly hire or continue to employ illegal immigrants. Wal-Mart also agreed to continue cooperating with federal officials investigating its contractors.
The settlement was announced by Michael J. Garcia, the assistant secretary of the Department of Homeland Security who heads the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Bureau, and by Thomas A. Marino, United States Attorney for the Middle District of Pennsylvania.
They praised Wal-Mart officials for providing complete cooperation after the October 2003 raids.
Mr. Garcia said the case "breaks new ground not only because this is a record dollar amount for a civil immigration settlement, but because this settlement requires Wal-Mart to create an internal program to ensure future compliance with immigration laws by Wal-Mart contractors and by Wal-Mart itself."
© 2005 The New York Times
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The quotes in italics
are from the NYT article. Comments in plain text following excerpts are
by Ben Price of the Community
Environmental Legal Defense Fund. (walmart intentionally appears in
lower case because the writer wishes to emphasize
that it is not a "proper noun" person to which
we refers, but property, a thing.)
Federal investigators said they had decided not to bring criminal charges against Wal-Mart, the nation's largest retailer, because it was cooperating and had pledged strong action to prevent future employment of illegal immigrants at its 3,600 stores in the United States.
Imagine being investigated for a crime as an individual citizen, in these days of minimum sentencing guidlines, and being fined less than an hour's pay instead of facing charges simply because you promised to "be good" in the future!
100 janitors who were illegal immigrants were arrested in 2001 at Wal-Mart stores in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Missouri and New York, and an additional 245 were arrested in October 2003 at 60 stores in 21 states.
The hourly workers, on the other hand, were arrested and charged. They lost 100% of their future earnings, such that they would have been, and their legal status will likely involve deportation.
Wal-Mart, which did not admit any wrongdoing in the settlement, had $288.2 billion in sales last year.
No wrong-doing? Could the workers plead ignorance so successfully?
Wal-Mart reached the settlement two months after it began a publicity campaign to portray itself as a model employer, saying that it pays higher wages than most retailers.
We should wonder what opportunity to "reach a settlement" resulting in no criminal charges, a miniscule fine, and a PR campaign to change public perceptions about "illegal aliens" was available to the arrested janitors.
Wal-Mart continues to face a federal class-action lawsuit in New Jersey asserting that it and its contractors had conspired to violate racketeering laws. The lawsuit says that more than 10,000 illegal immigrant janitors were used at Wal-Mart stores and that they were virtually never paid time-and-a-half for overtime.
And the walmart PR was just disinformation...disseminated tax-free on the public airwaves.
Wal-Mart officials said the $11 million was not a fine, but a voluntary payment that would be used to help ensure compliance with immigration laws.
Yes, and the arrested workers have decided to chip-in as workers in the industrialized prison workforce until they receive an all-expenses paid trip back to their beloved homelands.
The settlement permanently bars Wal-Mart from hiring illegal immigrants and directs it to establish within 18 months a mechanism to make sure that its contractors "are taking reasonable steps to comply with immigration laws."
18 months to document that contracted temp agencies are being reasonable about immigration laws? This is the "cooperation" Wal-Mart officers extended? Now, just who was being accommodating?
The settlement was announced by Michael J. Garcia, the assistant secretary of the Department of Homeland Security who heads the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Bureau, and by Thomas A. Marino, United States Attorney for the Middle District of Pennsylvania.
They praised Wal-Mart officials for providing complete cooperation after the October 2003 raids.
How is it that the Wal-Mart officers who broke the law are being praised and the workers they hired at sub-living wages and under coercive working conditions are being jailed?
Mr. Garcia said the case "breaks new ground not only because this is a record dollar amount for a civil immigration settlement, but because this settlement requires Wal-Mart to create an internal program to ensure future compliance with immigration laws by Wal-Mart contractors and by Wal-Mart itself."
What's the liklihood that immigrant workers will be allowed to organize and hire lawyers that can represent their members to the Department of Homeland Security in order to similarly negotiate "an internal program to ensure compliance [sic]with immigration laws?"
The next step can't be an attempt to "even the playing field between corporate 'rights' and human rights." It's time for the corporate marching band to yield the field to the real players: We the People.
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