Workers demand back pay

Immigrant and undocumented workers are not only marching in the streets demanding their rights, they are demanding rights on the job too. When Arandas restaurant in Waterford, Mich., refused to pay its wait staff for two months, six women refused to work without pay and shut it down. Arandas owes each woman from $1,000 to $7,000 in back pay. Two of the unpaid workers are only 16 years old.

Three of the six Arandas workers (shown in photo) were in Detroit on April 10 to protest the unjust firing of 15 Latina meat cutters at Wolverine Packing. They also discussed their own situation.

Angeles, a 24-year-old undocumented mother of two young children, said, “Because we are Mexican, we don’t have papers, we don’t speak English, they take advantage of us. I am not asking for anything free. I am only asking for the salary that is owed to us.”

Angeles and her two co-workers were among the 50,000 who flooded Detroit streets and surrounded the Federal Building on March 27. So were the 15 Latinas from Wolverine Packing.

“They were fired for standing up for their rights,” said Elena Herrada.

A multi-national labor/community delegation confronted Wolverine Packing spokesperson Steve Reppenhagen on the packing plant steps in Eastern Market near downtown Detroit. The fight for justice on the job and in the streets is growing.

—Story and photo by Cheryl LaBash