Free Republic

MONTROSE — Sen. Ken Salazar (D-Colo.) cosponsored a bill introduced last week intended to ease the burdens of farmers and the immigrant workers they hire. “The senator (Salazar) is supportive of the bill in its form as standalone,” Drew Nannis, Salazar’s press secretary, said. However, the senator would like to see it passed as part of comprehensive immigration reform that would attend to problems such as border security and human rights as well. The bipartisan Senate Bill 237, known as AgJOBS, would allow illegal immigrants who have worked in agriculture at least 150 days of the past two years to...

In an apparent crackdown on illegal immigrants that may signal more to come, Cintas, the large uniform manufacturer, placed six employees from its San Jose plant on unpaid leave Monday. The move came after the workers failed to verify their Social Security numbers, a document required by employers to prove their workers have the right to be employed in the United States. About 60 Cintas workers, labor organizers and immigrant advocates, rallying outside the East San Jose plant Monday afternoon, denounced the action. With 30,000 workers in five states, Cintas, is believed to be the first company in the country...

In one instance, a county employee received a $5,000 reimbursement for a three-week class at Harvard University that cost $10,000. But the report found the employee attended class on county time and submitted the reimbursement request a year after the course was completed -- both violations of the program's guidelines.

For prostitutes working the streets of New Orleans, the post-flood era has sparked a boom in business, largely owing to the influx of an estimated 40,000 to 50,000 out-of-town workers away from their families with money to blow, police said. It's "like the Super Bowl" for sex workers, said Deputy Chief James Scott, commander of the Police Department's Intelligence Division, from his division's headquarters in a trailer. Though police are making more arrests for prostitution than before Hurricane Katrina, Scott said quantifying such results is difficult because undercover officers often can't develop conclusive evidence to make a clear-cut prostitution case....

Chicago Workers Practice Emergency Drill Friday September 8, 2006 3:46 AM By MICHAEL TARM Associated Press Writer CHICAGO (AP) - Thousands of people working in downtown high-rise buildings left their jobs early Thursday to test the city's response to a terrorist attack or other emergency. Participants, many with tennis shoes on their feet and water bottles in hand, left their offices and, under the direction of emergency teams, walked about five blocks to an assessment area. Once checked in, they were free to go. Officials said more than 3,000 people took part in the voluntary drill, which involved four properties...

Happy Labor Day: We're All Workers! by Edward Hudgins The Atlas Society & Objectivist Center ehudgins@objectivistcenter.org When Congress declared Labor Day a national holiday in 1894 it marked not only a celebration by workers but a division of Americans into groups often seen as opposed to one another. The day grew out of a desire to get governments to force employers to offer certain terms of employment to workers. The first Labor Day parade took place in 1882 in New York and was organized by Peter McGuire who helped found the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions. The "labor"...

The federal government is considering new rules that would toughen laws against companies hiring undocumented immigrants. The proposed regulations would require companies to respond promptly to letters from the government alerting them to discrepancies between the names of employees and their Social Security numbers, or else be liable for violating immigration laws. Employers currently are under no obligation to respond to these “no-match” letters from the Social Security Administration; there are no criminal or administrative penalties. But if the new regulations are enacted, companies would be liable for having “constructive knowledge” of hiring undocumented immigrants – if they were to...

WASHINGTON - Big increases in immigration since 1990 have not hurt employment prospects for American workers, says a study released Thursday. The report comes as Congress and much of the nation are debating immigration policy, a big issue in this fall's midterm congressional elections. The Pew Hispanic Center found no evidence that increases in immigration led to higher unemployment among Americans, said Rakesh Kochhar, who authored the study. Kochhar said other factors, such as economic growth, played a larger role than immigration in setting the job market for Americans. The study, however, did not look at whether wages were affected...

The Schwarzenegger administration must ask state lawmakers for the money to hire hundreds of mental health workers for California's prison system, under a federal judge's order made public Monday. The order from U.S. District Judge Lawrence Karlton is the latest in a string of actions in which federal overseers are driving reforms in the state's troubled corrections department. Separate lawsuits have placed federal courts in charge of much of the state's prison operations, including inmate safety, employee discipline and its inmate health care and mental health systems. A state court, meanwhile, is ordering reforms to the juvenile justice system. Last...

MIDDLETOWN, Ohio - At his Tienda La Raza grocery store and restaurant, Jose Bravo sells Spanish-language DVDs and Mexico soccer jerseys, chorizo sausage and chopped cactus. Lately, there has been another hot seller — one-way bus tickets out of here. "People that had been in the United States for a while, who were planning to stay, now they feel scared," Bravo said. He said he has sold at least 10 tickets in recent weeks to people who are moving to Michigan or other parts of Ohio, or who have decided to go back to Mexico. Tough talk on immigration over...

After nearly two weeks off the job, two cafeteria workers Downtown will be allowed this week to return to work. The two women, who together have worked in food service at the U.S. Courthouse and in the William S. Moorhead Federal Building for 44 years, were removed from their positions on July 5 when the Department of Homeland Security declared them "unsuitable," after conducting background checks on them

Workers Remove Litter from Iraqi Streets The street-cleaning project focuses on the busiest streets first, then moves to residential areas. By U.S. Army Spc. Cassandra Groce 133rd Mobile Public Affairs Detachment HAWIJA, Iraq, July 11, 2006 -- Piles of trash and litter, the scourge of many Iraqi cities, are being removed by local workers from the street and alleys of Hawija, Iraq.Sanitation has been a continual concern for Coalition Forces and the Iraqi leadership. The street-cleaning project currently cleans the busiest streets, but will soon move to residential areas. The project employs many civilians. “This was a good project...

More Rain Likely for Soaked NortheastBy STEPHEN MANNING Tuesday, June 27, 2006 WASHINGTON - Workers pumped water from the IRS headquarters' flooded basement Tuesday and mopped up at other government buildings Monday after heavy rain swamped the nation's capital. A brief break from the two-day deluge gave crews a chance to reopen commuter routes and set up sandbags to prevent more water from getting inside buildings. More than 7 inches of rain fell on the nation's capital in a 24-hour period Sunday and Monday, shutting down several federal buildings and closing some of the city's busiest tourist attractions just days...

Attorney General Thomas F. Reilly said yesterday it is not his responsibility to crack down on Massachusetts employers that hire undocumented immigrants, and he said he will continue his policy of taking no action against the companies. In 2001, Reilly established a policy, saying his office would aggressively fight for the rights and wages of immigrant workers, legal or not, and promise not to report them to federal authorities. He also said he would enforce wage and labor laws against companies, but not act against them for employing undocumented immigrants. Yesterday he stood by that, even as a Globe story...

A lawsuit has been filed in U.S. District Court here by three migrant farmworkers from Thailand against two local growers and a Los Angeles-based labor contractor, alleging that the workers were underpaid and housed in substandard conditions. In the suit filed on Monday, some of the workers said they were forced to go into personal debt in order to get a job in the United States. They said they were promised work that didn't materialize. A number of alleged violations of state and federal law were outlined in the suit. It seeks class action status for all Thai workers brought...

WASHINGTON - Remember the Department of Homeland Security's "no-fly'' lists that erratically flagged 3-year-old children and dozens of men named David Nelson as terrorists seeking to board commercial airplanes? Well, now privacy experts are warning America to prepare for the "no-work'' list. As Congress debates immigration reform, experts say a little-discussed aspect of the bill, mandatory employee eligibility verification, is likely to have a colossal impact on the lives of every person in the U.S. labor market -- citizen and foreigner alike. "Everyone who wants to work will feel this provision,'' said Tim Sparapani, legal counsel for the American Civil...

The work of harvesting sugarcane is grueling - even worse than picking cotton. With a knife, a cutter slices the cane stalk as close to the ground as possible. Standing in wet, soft muck soil, he chops off the leaves and the top of the stalk, tossing the cane into a pile. He does this thousands of times a day - stooping, cutting, standing, cutting, stacking, stooping. To guard against the sharp leaves and the swinging knife, cutters wear aluminum shields on their wrists and legs, as well as many layers, even in the hot Florida sun. Given those conditions,...

USA Citizens Day - July 1st Immigration Control Rally Nationwide Rally on Saturday, July 1st, at noon, at your City HallMay 1st - Million of Illegal Aliens Marched in our StreetsTwelve million illegal aliens demonstrated their political power, and declared May 1st to be A Day Without Undocumented Workers ( illegal aliens ). They boycotted the USA, all US businesses and institutions. Millions of them marched in our streets, carried Mexican flags, shouted "Si se puede!", and demanded new laws from our Congress. July 1st - U.S. Citizens Nationwide Rally for Immigration ControlRally to stop our continuous invasion by...

Washington -- The current migration of Mexicans and Central Americans to the United States is one of the largest diasporas in modern history, experts say. Roughly 10 percent of Mexico's population of about 107 million is now living in the United States, estimates show. About 15 percent of Mexico's labor force is working in the United States. One in every 7 Mexican workers migrates to the United States. Mass migration from Mexico began more than a century ago. It is deeply embedded in the history, culture and economies of both nations. The current wave began with Mexico's economic crisis in...

Propelled by a free trade agreement with the United States, apparel manufacturing is booming in Jordan, its exports to America soaring twentyfold in the last five years. But some foreign workers in Jordanian factories that produce garments for Target, Wal-Mart and other American retailers are complaining of dismal conditions — of 20-hour days, of not being paid for months and of being hit by supervisors and jailed when they complain. [...] "We used to start at 8 in the morning, and we'd work until midnight, 1 or 2 a.m., seven days a week," said Nargis Akhter, a 25-year-old Bangladeshi who,...