PICO RIVERA, Calif. — Nearly 500 Walmart workers and supporters rallied outside the Walmart store here Nov. 13 to demand $15 an hour and full-time work. They were also protesting the company’s retaliation against workers fighting for these demands.

Cheers rang out when workers walked out of the store and joined the demonstration. Twenty-three marchers were arrested after they sat down at the nearby busy intersection of Washington Blvd. and Paramount blocking traffic. Earlier in the day workers sat in at the Walmart store in the Baldwin Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles.

A week before the protest, Evelin Cruz, a worker at the Pico Rivera store, was fired after posting on her Facebook page, “We can’t pay our bills, but we can STRIKE against Walmart’s illegal retaliation. I am ready to strike!”

“Both Victoria Martinez and I are known as leaders of this fight,” Cruz told the Militant. They were fired, she said, on the pretext of a labeling and paperwork mistake that they weren’t even responsible for.

Walmart workers are planning more nationwide protests on Nov. 28.