The May 12, 2008 Postville, Iowa Immigration Raid: A Human Rights Perspective
| Author | Allison L. McCarthy |
| Position | J.D. December, 2009, The University of Iowa College of Law. |
| Pages | 02 |
Page 294
"Remember, remember always that all of us, and you and I especially, are descended from immigrants and revolutionists."1 Franklin D. Roosevelt aptly describes the perspective from which this Note is written. The dramatic events of the May 12, 2008 immigration raid in Postville, Iowa implicated the lives of many individuals from communities around the world. Each of these individuals was present and working in the united states because of an inherent human desire to establish a better life. This Note argues that the May 12, 2008 immigration raid in Postville, Iowa marks a gross failure in government enforcement of international labor standards for immigrant workers in the United States. The Note further contends that the inadequate state and federal legal responses toward the executives and supervisors of Agriprocessors Inc. ("Agriprocessors") illustrate the dire need to conceptualize immigrant labor rights as a human rights issue. The failure to do so often results in characterizing immigration raids as implicating only immigration or labor issues, to the detriment of the human rights of the many immigrant workers involved.
We should respect the human rights of immigrant workers regardless of our personal opinions about the enforcement of immigration laws. Working without legal authorization in the united states is extremely common despite the u.s. Immigration and customs Enforcement ("IcE") Agency's enforcement efforts and the harsh penalties imposed. At first glance, this seems counterintuitive. However, "[g]iven that the U.S. is the first choice for most migrants less than optimal outcomes are accepted by many immigrants."2 For many individuals coming to the united states in search of work, the potential economic benefits outweigh the significant risks of being caught, arrested, and deported. Then, when these individuals settle in the United States more permanently, they often work without legal protection of their most fundamental human rights.
The need for respect of human rights is further illustrated both by IcE's treatment of immigrant workers after the raid and by the u.s. government's failure to ratify many international labor agreements protecting human rights. America's immigration and labor policies should reflect the fact that immigration status bears no relationship to the human rights protections afforded workers. There are certain fundamental rights and protections that no employed human being should be denied, regardless of citizenship. Page 295 Furthermore, the United States should take the initiative to implement policies consistent with its status as a worldwide leader in human rights.
ICE made 389 arrests during the May 12, 2008 immigration raid at the Agriprocessors kosher slaughterhouse in Postville, Iowa.3 This was both the largest immigration raid in Iowa's history and the nation's "largest criminal worksite enforcement operation" to date.4 Although the public seemed surprised by the news of the May 12, 2008 arrests, ICE officials had been planning the Postville raid for months. 5 That morning, black helicopters circled the Postville plant as ICE led law enforcement agents from over sixteen federal, state, and local agencies in the raid on the slaughterhouse employees.6 In a sad irony, the immigrants were brought from the slaughterhouse to the National Cattle Congress in Waterloo, Iowa, a "[f]acility normally used to show livestock . . . that served as a temporary detention facility and makeshift courthouse in the aftermath of the raid."7
The 389 immigrants arrested amounted to almost 10 percent of Postville's population. 8 The Washington Post reported that "[h]alf of the school system's 600 students were absent [the day after the raid], including 90 percent of Hispanic children, because their parents were arrested or in hiding."9 The Postville Community Schools Superintendent, David Page 296 Strudthoff, compared the event to "a natural disaster-only this one [was] manmade."10 The ICE buses with state police escorts brought many of the immigrants to the temporary courthouse at the National Cattle Congress to begin the intake process for deportation and removal proceedings, and for criminal charges, including document fraud and identity theft. 11
There has been a public outcry about the events leading up to and resulting in the May 12, 2008 raid at the Agriprocessors meat-packing plant. It is tragic that ICE officials swept in and decimated an entire community, turning it into a "ghost town" where people feared separation from their loved ones, imprisonment, and deportation.12 A priest from the Immaculate Conception Parish in Cedar Rapids, which is heavily involved with the Hispanic community in Eastern Iowa, described the raid as "inhumane."13Approximately 200 protestors who gathered outside of the National Cattle Congress in Waterloo chanted, "We have rights!" and waved signs reading "Honk for Human Rights" as arrestees arrived for processing.14
On November 21, 2008, federal prosecutors indicted the former CEO, three company managers, and a human resources employee from Agriprocessors with twelve counts of labor, fraud, and immigration-related offenses.15 Additionally, the Iowa Attorney General's office alleged that Agriprocessors' supervisors knowingly allowed minors to run dangerous power equipment, including meat grinders, circular saws, and power shears; expose themselves to dangerous chemicals; work during prohibited hours; and work more hours than legally permitted.16 Furthermore, they failed to pay child workers for the overtime they performed and used hiring practices that "encouraged job applicants to submit identification documents which were forgeries and known to contain false information as to resident alien status, age and identity."17 Agriprocessors allegedly paid their workers below Page 297 minimum wage, usually between five and six dollars per hour, even after the employees had worked at the plant for an extended period of time. 18 Finally, Agriprocessors' supervisors allegedly physically abused workers, including one notable case where a supervisor "covered the eyes of an employee with duct tape and struck him with a meat hook."19
Prosecutors charged Sholom Rubashkin, former Vice President of Agriprocessors, with "conspiracy to harbor illegal aliens for profit, harboring illegal aliens for profit, conspiring to commit document fraud, aiding and abetting document fraud, aiding and abetting aggravated identity theft, and bank fraud."20 In January, prosecutors added charges of money laundering, immigration conspiracy, and "willful violation of an order of the U.S. secretary of agriculture."21 Two managers of the plant, Hosam Amar and Zeev Levi, were both charged with a slightly shorter list of similar crimes, but have since fled the United States, prompting the Department of Homeland Security ("DHS") to declare them fugitives.22 In March 2009, Chief Judge Reade sentenced former Agriprocessors supervisor, Martin De La Rosa-Loera, to twenty-three months in federal prison for aiding and abetting in "harboring illegal aliens," and for encouraging plant employees to acquire fraudulent employment authorization documents.23 Later, the charges against Rubashkin and three plant managers were expanded to a 163-count indictment.24 In November 2009, a federal jury convicted Rubashkin with eighty-six counts of business fraud in the first of two planned criminal trials; however, federal prosecutors dropped the seventy-two immigration-related charges shortly thereafter.25
Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller also charged the plant's operations manager, Brent Beebe, with a similar list of crimes.26 In September 2008, Page 298 Miller filed over 9000 counts of child labor violations against Agriprocessors' joint presidents and owners, Abraham Aaron Rubashkin and Sholom Rubashkin, as well as against management-level employees Elizabeth Billmeyer, Laura Althouse, and Karina Freund.27 In Iowa, state child labor violations are simple misdemeanors and each daily violation is "punishable by up to 30 days in jail and a fine of $65 to $625 per count."28 The state-level case is stayed until 2010. 29
ICE's lack of cooperation and information-sharing when conducting the Agriprocessors raid prevented and disrupted the U.S. Department of Labor's efforts to target Agriprocessors, management, and owners.30 Mark Lauritsen, International Vice President of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, argued that the ICE raid "disrupted a separate U.S. Labor Department investigation into alleged child labor law violations and other infractions."31 Unfortunately, this means that the May 12, 2008 raid has been re-characterized as an immigration raid that was orchestrated and implemented by DHS...
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