Last October, during a union-organizing drive at the hotel, the INS arrested eight Mexican-born union supporters and sought to deport them, and the company fired them. The eight workers decided to take on their boss and the INS from their jail cells. They received the backing of their union, the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union (HERE), as well as their church, the Holy Rosary Church in Minneapolis.

The workers defeated their boss in an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission case, with the Centro Legal Inc., a nonprofit organization, providing legal representation. In January the Holiday Inn Express agreed to pay each worker $8,000 for workplace abuses.

In addition, seven of the eight workers won a reprieve from the INS April 25 allowing them to stay and work in the United States for two years. The INS refused to include an eighth worker, Anado Flores, in the agreement because he appeared on INS records as having previously been deported and reentered the country without proper documentation.

When the victory for the immigrant workers was announced, more than 100 cheering supporters were on hand outside the immigration court in the suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota.  
 
Workers tell their story
At a June 12 march and rally organized by meatpacking workers at Dakota Premium Foods in South St. Paul, two of the Holiday Inn Express workers who joined the action in solidarity, Rosa Albino and Evertina Albino, told their story to the Militant. The packinghouse workers are engaged in a battle against their employer to organize themselves into United Food and Commercial Workers Local 789.

"It all started because we decided we had to do something about the treatment we were getting on the job," said Evertina Albino. "They would give us too many rooms to clean, we would get no breaks, and the supervisor treated us poorly. They would give us 15 minutes to clean each room."

"We would have to go get our own towels and sheets, and if they weren't clean, we would have to wait for them," explained Rosa Albino. "The supervisor would try to punch out our time cards if we didn't finish on time--even if we started late because he hadn't shown up on time." Rosa is Evertina's younger sister. She had been working at the Holiday Inn Express for about a year, and Evertina for four months.

"And they wouldn't give us uniforms, only a T-shirt," Rosa Albino added scornfully.

"We were upset," she said. "We weren't treated like other people on the job. They treated us like that because we are Mexican, and we wanted equality."

"We had a co-worker that had worked in a hotel where there was a union," Evertina explained when asked how the union began to be discussed. "And she started talking about it at work. Then we met a union organizer and we began to have meetings, being careful in the process."

The boss became aware of the ongoing organizing drive and arranged for the INS to come to the hotel to arrest the immigrant workers.

"The boss told us we had a meeting at 10:30 a.m.," Evertina Albino said. "We went to the meeting expecting to hear a lecture from the boss. The meeting would not start, but he kept us there saying an interpreter for the meeting was late. A short time later he walked in the door--with the immigration officers."

The two sisters reported that all the workers, including another sister, were handcuffed and taken to a van. "They took us to a place two hours away from Bloomington. They took all our belongings--earrings, rings, hair suspenders, everything. And we had to put on orange uniforms," Evertina said.

"They put us in a cell that was cold and filthy," said Rosa. "The food was bad and we each had to sit next to the toilet in our cell."

"Our sister got sick in that place. She was sick for two days. We waited for medicine for 12 hours," Evertina explained. "Seven days after they arrested us, they brought us to the INS offices in Minneapolis and made us sign [a voluntary leave form] to leave the country, because we had to pay a $6,000 dollar fine otherwise."

The Albino sisters reported that while they were in jail at the INS facilities, Father Edward Leahy, from the Holy Rosary Church in Minneapolis, contacted the workers. He told them they did not have to leave the country and that the union would pay the fine. "We knew Father Edward because we sang in the church's choir. We talked about it and decided we would stay."

At the June 12 Dakota Premium rally, several workers were introduced to Rosa and Evertina Albino, including some of the leaders of the union-organizing drive at the packing plant.

Miguel Olvera, a worker in the boning department at Dakota, told Rosa and Evertina Albino that he was grateful "for your participation in the protest and for your example. We all know about your struggle."

"I tell people we shouldn't take abuse," said Evertina as the march began, "because if you don't speak up, you won't be able to get anything. We are all human beings."

"Besides," said Rosa Albino, "if we were not here they wouldn't get their work done. They hire us because we are good workers."  
 
 
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