People of Faith Respond to Department of Justice Indictments Against Tyson

It is general knowledge that there are several million undocumented workers in this country. What is less widely known is the level of exploitation that exists in our nation’s poultry industry among documented and undocumented workers alike.

U.S. Department of Justice indicted Tyson Foods yesterday, December 19, for “conspiring to smuggle illegal immigrants.” According to the indictment, Tyson Foods “cultivated a corporate culture in which the hiring of illegal alien workers was condoned in order to meet production goals and cut costs to maximize profits.”

Unfortunately, in the experience of the Interfaith Worker Justice, Tyson is not alone in its pattern of exploiting immigrant workers. In 2000, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) investigated the poultry industry and found 100 percent noncompliance with wage and hour laws in the 51 plants investigated. In addition, since 1999, hundreds of Tyson workers have filed private lawsuits to recover back wages for hours worked and not paid.

For over a year, the National Interfaith Committee, religious leaders and worker advocates have urged U.S. Department of Labor Secretary Elaine Chao to recover the estimated $430 million in back wages owed workers as follow up to the poultry investigation.

Sixteen U.S. senators, primarily from poultry states, have sought to minimize the importance of paying workers for time spent putting on and taking off protective gear that insures safety, which workers have reported takes 20 to 40 minutes a day. But the poultry industry and their political allies have urged Sec. Chao to renege on collecting back wages, who is still undecided.

The Justice Department indictment further brings into light the long-standing pattern of exploiting and underpaying workers.

The religious community has stood strongly in support of all poultry workers, documented and undocumented being treated justly and paid for all hours worked. United Methodist Church General Board of Pensions filed a shareholder resolution on worker issues in 2001 at Tyson’s annual meeting, and the Roman Catholic Bishops of the South issued a Poultry Pastoral advocating better worker conditions for poultry workers. The primary concern of the religious community is not whether workers are documented or undocumented, but how workers are treated in the workplace. This concern flows from Scripture such as:

“We must not take advantage of a hired worker who is poor and needy, whether the worker is a resident or immigrant living in our town. We must pay the worker the wages promptly because the worker is poor and counting on it.” (Deuteronomy 21:14).

We continue to urge Sec. Chao to be diligent in collecting back wages and committing resources to finding the workers who may have left the plants. These are low-wage workers who need the wages that they should have been paid. In addition Sec. Chao must make future compliance with wage and hour laws a priority in the Department of Labor.