RUBASHKIN TARGET OF ONGOING STATE & FEDERAL LABOR PROBE – Rubashkin Alleged to Employ Underage Illegal Workers Paid Under the Table, Fake OSHA Report May Come Back to Haunt

The Des Moines Register is reporting United Food and Commercial Workers Union leadership asked ICE not to raid Agriprocessors.

Why?

Because there is an ongoing Iowa and federal labor law violations investigation of Agriprocessors and the union fears Rubashkin will use the raid to intimidate workers and throw the next unionization vote:

…Mark Lauritsen, international vice president of the United Food and Commercial Workers, wrote a May 2 letter to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, advising officials of an ongoing labor dispute at the Postville plant.

Lauritsen said he was concerned that any potential ICE action could have a "chilling effect" on the existing workforce which has reported some Agriprocessors’ workplace violations in the past. In addition, ICE action could result in employees leaving the plant, interfering with a government investigation that would “ultimately uncover unscrupulous employer acts,” he said.

The union had been trying to organize the plant’s non-union workers for collective bargaining purposes, said Jill Cashen, a UFCW spokeswoman in Washington, D.C. What concerns union officials is that they had alerted state and federal labor officials of allegations that Agriprocessors was exploiting underage workers and was paying them off the books, she said Monday.

Now that hundreds of Agriprocessor employees have been taken into custody, “how can justice ever be served on these exploitation issues?” Cashen asked

Lauritsen said that employers at other workplaces where his union had been organizing have abused ICE’s actions not only to imtimidate employees before a National Labor Relations Board election, but to blame the union for immigration actions.

"With these labor disputes in progress, we urge you to suspend any potentially existing enforcement efforts and refuse to be involved in this labor dispute in accordance with the internal guidance, “Questioning Persons During Labor Disputes,” Lauritsen wrote. He said ICE participation had the potential to deprive the workers of their guaranteed protected rights.

Iowa Labor Commissioner Dave Neil confirmed Monday that a state investigation was underway of possible labor law violations at the Agriprocessors plant in Postville. The probe involved alleged violations of wage and child labor laws, he said.

“It is an ongoing investigation, and I can’t really get into the specifics,” Neil said.

Mike Staebell, assistant district director for the U.S. Department of Labor, said, "Yes, I can confirm that we have an open investigation" at Agriprocessors Inc. in Postville. He declined to provide additional details.

ICE spokesman Tim Counts said he had no immediate comment on the union's statement.

David Strudhoff, superintendent of Postville Community Schools, said Monday that school officials were served with a 21-point subpoena in early April from investigators with the Iowa Division of Labor Services seeking the records of Postville middle and high school students.

The subpoena compelled the school district to turn over names of all current students and students at the school between 2005 and 2007, their ages, addresses, dates of birth, telephone numbers and social security numbers. It also, compelled the school district to turn over proof of age, pictures for yearbook photos, passenger lists for all buses, truancy/nonattendance records for the same group and a list of non-graduates from 2005 to 2008.

The subpoena also compelled the school district to turn over a list of all full or part-time bus drivers from 2005 to 2008 and complete school records for 35 students identified only by last name.

In addition, the subpoena compelled the school district to turn over all current work permits for current students and those enrolled between 2005 and 2007. It also sought the employment contracts of Strudhoff and Guidance Counselor Ron Wahl.

Finally, the subpoena compelled the school district to turn over the names of all children working for Wahl at his two apartment buildings which were sold to Agriprocessor CEO, Sholom Rubashkin and all records on Wahl’s school computer or at Postville Community School District that relate to the students and former students of Postville Community Schools and Mr. Wahl’s work with and for Agriprocessor’s Rubashkin and any other entities associated with Agriprocessor’s and Sholom Rubashkin.

A Connection To Kosher Supervision?

I spoke with Iowa Labor Commissioner Dave Neil last year when Rabbi Asher Zeilingold, who gives kosher supervision to Rubashkin's non-glatt output, Sholom Rubashkin and Menachem Lubinsky floated that fake OSHA report 'exonerating' Rubashkin.

Unable to really comment because of various statutes involved, he was, shall we say, clearly shocked by the brazenness of Zeilingold, Rubashkin and Lubinsky.

Could the fake OSHA report be a part of the ongoing state and federal investigation?

Yes.

And, if it is, those involved in creating it and knowingly using it could very well be indicted.

[Hat Tip: Seymour, Ben Max, etc., et al.]

Comments

[steve]

Illegal Workers Paid Under the Table

You think that's all that was being paid under the table? What about all the politicians, rabbis, kashrut organizations, retired mashgichim, etc. The place is not only a drug infested, feces infested animal and human torture chamber, but also a laundromat.

[chnyock@gmail.com]

scottie finally got the story he was waiting for to happen. its like the AK who celebrated his 50th wedding anniversary Y2K and a great grandchild and now has no more milestones to live for....

[jewishwhistleblower]

Off-topic re: Rabbi Jack L. Sparks

http://www.delawareonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080512/NEWS/80512062

A rabbi who heads a nonprofit religious school in Talleyville was arrested by Newark police Monday on a child endangerment charge for allegedly fostering an inappropriate relationship with a teenage boy.

Rabbi Jack L. Sparks, 53, head of school at Albert Einstein Academy at 101 Garden of Eden Road, was released on unsecured bail on the misdemeanor charge, stemming from a relationship developed since February 2007 with a now 15-year-old boy, police said in court records.
...

[Yossi (Joe) Izrael]

I'm not sure this is cause for celebration - not yet anyway. Sholom can buy his way out, who knows how long he can continue.

The really good news is that ICE will have to start cracking down on illegal immigrants all over - Iowa is replete with meatpackers, and the practice is widespread. With money getting tighter every day, maybe we'll finally reinstitute the true American workforce. What I'm really concerned about is that a bunch of influential wheeny whinies will start saying it's all because anti-Semitism and ICE has no right to raid Jewish/black/hispanic businesses etc.

BTW pages load extremely slowly. Drop some of your crap Shmukya.

[Paul Freedman]

I don't understand the UCFW's strategy of attempting to unionizing an illegal workplace. I see the social justice in attempting to help those who are already marginal due to their non-documented status avoid economic and human exploitation but it would seem to position the union between a rock and a hard place, caught between helping their potential members and enabling the predatory owners of the factor resources, and hampered by the actual reality that the employees to be organized are valid candidates for deportation or, if reports are accurate, other individuals who should not have been employed in the first place.

[state of the Jews]

If I were the people in Postville, I'd check the smoke detector in my house. I seem to remember something about another Rubashkin plant in trouble that burned to the ground.
Then again, how do you make a tornado?

[anonymous]

And why do you let JWB crap all over your threads?

Get your own blog loser.

Oh wait. That didnt work.....

[steve]

In February 2008, a confidential informant identified as “Source 7,” who has worked with federal agents in past immigration cases, detailed several incidents of alleged worker abuse at the plant.

The source, who was lawfully employed at the plant, told authorities that a floor supervisor duct-taped the eyes of an illegal Guatemalan employee and struck him with a meat hook

They get a lot of use out those meat hooks.

[Isa]

Who would have guess that Rubiskin got hit with the FULL government treatment: Hovering Black helicopters, hundreds of government agents, all sorts of agencys getting the 'green light' to investigate IRS,FBI,DEA, ha ha ha, the vultures will be coming for miles around to feast!!Maybe even the crooked rabbis who took money will be questioned under penalty of perjury.

[ben chosen/g-dfather]

How will this affect the kosher meat industry? Will there be a shortage of kosher meat? Will prices go up?

[Isa]

Hey this thing in on Drudge Report!!
That cheap bastard was ONLY paying the illegals $5.00 an hour!! A coolie's wage!
One time I worked on a scientific instrument at Iowa Beef Processors and I got a cut on head, so they took me to medical... Oh wow, what I saw, it was like a MASH in a war zone, horrible cuts, shirts soaked in blood, etc, etc and etc.

[Nigritude Ultramarine]

This is what the OU's attitude that they are only concerned about kashrus issues in a facility got them. It looks like they gave a hechsher to an illegal workplace that was exploiting child labor and housed a meth lab.

[uncle joe mccarthy]

so not only were they employing illegals, but child labor and paying below the minimum wage...and none of this wouldve come to the fore were this not an election year, with the republicans running for cover...shades of upton sinclair's the jungle.

[Tzemach]

He is rich and you are not.

[uncle joe mccarthy]

i really hope that rubashkin isnt the only plant they hit.

read fast food nation...this is occuring in almost every meat packing plant and slaughter house in the country.

[tante shmatte]

Agri has announced they will be open for business bright and early May 13, 2008. There may be some delays in certain products, but it is business as usual despite this bru ha ha. The only people who will pay the cost of this scandal is the kosher consumer. Agri will raise their prices through the roof and get away with it because they have a monopoly on the kosher slaughter business.

[shmuel]

Monopoly? Time to boycott all Rubashkin products. ALL. How anyone could possibly buy and eat their filthy illegal meat is beyond comprehension. Shame on the OU if they stick with this hellhole of a chillul Hashem of a drug den.

[tante shmatte]

If you eat glatt kosher beef in the US, it probably comes from Agri - either Postville or South America/Uruguay. Most likely your local butcher shop/grocery store gets its stock from Agri and cuts and repackages it for resale. A much smaller percentage of the glatt kosher meat supply is from the likes of Alley, Inter, Hassideshe Glatt, Western Glatt, etc. The majority of the kosher glatt market is from Agri.

[yidandahalf]

Tante, eventually kosher meat will become prohibitively expensive for most of the former kosher consumer market. Your posts are informative and clear headed; I hope you post more here.

Tante, eventually kosher meat will become prohibitively expensive for most of the former kosher consumer market. Your posts are informative and clear headed; I hope you post more here.

Posted by: yidandahalf | May 13, 2008 at 07:26 AM

Not the first self-hating Jew to prematurely and joyfully greet the arrival of Jew's loyalty to Torah.

The 'experts' predicted as late as the fifties and sixties that Orthodoxy would continue to shrivel and die while the Conservative and Reform movements would flourish and soon be the only kids on the block.

[Larry Lennhoff]

Tante, eventually kosher meat will become prohibitively expensive for most of the former kosher consumer market.

If Kosher meat becomes prohibitively expensive, that just means we'll only have meat on Shabbat and Yom Tov. If it gets really high, then maybe only on Yom Tov, or even only on Pesach. I see no reason to think most observant Jews will eat treif meat rather than go to a mostly non-meat diet.

[PETA - People Eating Tasty Animals]

If they are gone for good someone else will step in and fill the void.

An end to the Glatt Kosher meat industry is just wishful thinking on the part of a bunch of self-hating and torah-hating Jews. There might be short term supply problems on certain cuts of meat but long term we will be back to using cows for their intended purposes - Bar B Ques and shoe leather.

[R]

why do you make as if glatt meat is the only kosher meat? Just buy kosher meat. Forget the glatt sticker that is a hoax to begin with.

[yidandahalf]

WTF is "joyfully greet the arrival of Jew's loyalty to Torah"? I'm up for any kind of diatribe, hateful invective and what have you. At least be understandable.

[Yochanan Lavie]

R: I buy Hebrew National. Glatt shouldn't be the only kosher. I have heard it's a statistical impossibility for all the meat sold as glatt to be literally glatt. (Correct me if I'm wrong).

An alternative to a vegan diet (in which I'd starve to death) is not eating red meat. I don't eat so much red meat. I eat mostly poultry and fish.

[yidandahalf]

"Glatt" is merely a very clever marketing slogan/word at this point in time. It sounds different, it sounds cooler than 'kosher' - the gentiles love it. They can't get enough. The 'kosher' meat industry is thinking down the road and they are smart. "Glatt" is just part of that thinking.

[Yochanan Lavie]

Yid & 1/2: Maybe "Glatt" is Yiddish for "overpriced."

(Haters: Yes, I know what it really means in Yiddish).

[steve]

Coming soon: Glatt kosher fish, glatt kosher cheese, and the ultimate, GLATT KOSHER TABLECLOTHS!!!

[Yochanan Lavie]

There already is Glatt Kosher chicken, when I doubt a Lilliputian schochet blows up the little lungs to check for lesions.