FINALLY! A Demonstration AGAINST the Attacks on Immigrants

This article appeared in the Associated Press.

An important demonstration took place yesterday in Iowa City, in support of immigrant workers and against the all-too-typical dangerous and exploitative working conditions at a large meat-packing plant there. It is worth noting that this important action drew people from across the Midwest and was mainly organized by progressive religious forces.

Following is an account from the Dallas Morning News.

Protesters criticize Iowa meatpacking plant

July 28, 2008 (Associated Press)
POSTVILLE, Iowa – About 1,000 people, including rabbis, Hispanic immigrants and Catholic clergy, marched through this farm town Sunday, protesting working conditions at Agriprocessors Inc.

Following a raid on the plant in May, federal investigators said they found the plant had employed more than 20 underage workers, some as young as 13.

Some of the underage laborers said they worked shifts of 12 hours or more, wielding razor-edged knives and saws to slice freshly killed beef. Some worked through the night, sometimes six nights a week.

One, a Guatemalan named Elmer L., who said he was 16 when he started working on the plant’s killing floors, said he worked 17-hour shifts, six days a week. “I felt like I was a slave,” he said in an affidavit.

Because of the dangers of the work, it is illegal in Iowa for a company to employ anyone under 18 on the floor of a meatpacking plant.

Agriprocessors, owned and operated by Aaron Rubashkin and his family, is the largest kosher plant in the United States. Its products, sold as Aaron’s Best and Rubashkin’s, among others, dominate the nation’s market for kosher meat and poultry.

Overall, 389 illegal immigrants were detained, drawing protests from some in the town who said the raid had torn families apart.

Sunday’s march drew a counterprotest by about 150 people, organized by the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which opposes illegal immigrants and proposals to give them legal status.

The May raid also intensified the debate over kosher standards. Rabbi Harold Kravitz, from the Adath Jeshurun synagogue in Minnetonka, Minn., said Sunday that the health and safety issues raised by a commission of inquiry organized by Conservative Jewish leaders did not appear to have been addressed.

“Proper business conduct and treatment of workers also are important Jewish values,” Mr. Kravitz said.

Although Agriprocessors executives have largely avoided speaking to the news media, Getzel Rubashkin, 24, a grandson of Aaron Rubashkin, spoke to the rally.

“There’s no argument here,” said the younger Rubashkin, who said he works in the plant but is not a representative of Agriprocessors.

He said Agriprocessors managers “treat their workers well, and they pay their workers well, and there is no other policy,” he said.