In some cases bosses tried to victimize employees who demonstrated for immigrant rights, then often backed down as the result of protests. A few hundred have been fired from their jobs in factories, restaurants, banks, and other workplaces. The New York Times reported April 15 that the owners of one unidentified factory in Wisconsin reinstated 200 workers the bosses had dismissed. The turnaround came after march organizers “met with the employers, discussed the significance of the protests and threatened to identify the companies publicly,” the Times article said.

In Tyler, Texas, located about 100 miles southeast of Dallas, more than 2,000 people rallied April 10 on the National Day of Action for Immigrant Justice. “It was historic, we’d never had a protest like that before in Tyler,” rally organizer and attorney Jose Sanchez told the Militant. He said he had been inspired to initiate the action after John Tyler High School students had organized a walkout and march downtown in late March, and students at Stewart Middle School followed suit on April 7.

The bosses at Benchmark Manufacturing in nearby Lindale fired a third of the workforce of about 60 after workers joined the march, but claimed in a statement that the discharges were for violating “company policy” requiring phoning when absent.

“We told the boss that we were going to the march and they never said we would lose our jobs,” said María Rodríguez, one of the 22 fired workers. “Before, even if you didn’t call in, the worst you’d get is a written reprimand. But this time they had applicants coming in even as they were walking us out. We asked if we’d been fired, but they said ‘laid off.’ I can’t tell the difference.”

Another rally in Tyler to demand legal status for immigrants is planned for April 30. It will be an opportunity to put pressure on the company to hire back the fired Benchmark workers, said Sanchez. “It needs to be an issue at the rally.”

In Houston, six workers at the Mambo Seafood restaurant were fired for participating in the April 10 march there. In response, protesters rallied outside the restaurant April 14 demanding that the dismissed workers be rehired.

In Madison, Wisconsin, bosses at a few small businesses suspended or fired workers for attending the April 10 protests. Octopus Car Washes fired two workers at one of its three operations in town, but has pulled back from dismissing 10 others pending discussions with representatives of the April 10 Coalition. Owner Jeff Jurkens told the media he informed his employees they would not be disciplined for joining the march as long as their work shifts were covered. But only two of 12 workers came to work the day of the protest. Although company policy is “no show, no call, no job,” Jurkens backed off from firing all those absent that day after many of 100-plus callers to his company told him that if he abused immigrants they wouldn’t patronize his car wash anymore.  
 
Divisions on May 1 boycott
More protests are planned across the country April 29-May 1. Some groups are organizing a “Day without an immigrant” on Monday, May 1. They’re calling on immigrant workers not to shop, work, or go to school, and to join May Day marches. Leading proponents of the May 1 boycott include the Los Angeles-based Mexican-American Political Association and the ANSWER coalition, an antiwar group.

Many of those who backed the April 10 actions, however, especially in and around the Democratic Party, are taking their distance. Cardinal Roger Mahony, who promoted earlier immigrant rights rallies in Los Angeles, is opposing walkouts on May Day. “Go to work. Go to school. And then join thousands of us at a major rally afterwards,” Mahony said in a statement.

Joel Foster of Somos America, a coalition that helped organize the April 10 rallies in Arizona, told the Arizona Republic that his group is promoting alternative actions, such as candlelight vigils.

The National Capital Immigrant Coalition in Washington, which helped organize the half-million-strong rally there, held a press conference in D.C. April 19 to distance itself from the boycott. Representatives of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights in Los Angeles, National Council of La Raza, National Korean American Service and Education Consortium, Casa de Maryland, and the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, also took part.

“This is something we need to take very seriously, and consider all the repercussions of not doing it right or of creating a backlash,” said Jaime Contreras, president of the capital coalition and chairman of a Service Employees International Union local there. “It’s premature to do the boycott May 1.”

Contreras and others said they’ll call rallies on May 1 after work or school.

The United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) has been informing its Midwest locals that the union supports the immigrant workers’ cause for legalization but what UFCW members do on May 1 is their “personal decision.”

Edwin Fruit in Des Moines, Iowa; Steve Warshell in Houston; Michael Italie in New York; and Sam Manuel in Washington contributed to this article.  
 
 
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