The retailer, which is among the largest in the United States employing 41,500 workers in over 700 stores, reported that a similar probe is underway at its distribution center in Evansville, Indiana, where some 1,700 workers are employed.

According to the Scranton Times, the Pittston warehouse fired the workers—half of the workforce—after the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (BICE) investigated the center “at the behest of local officials” and listed workers it claimed had “fraudulent or counterfeit documents.”

“The confirmation of illegal aliens among the workforce at the huge distribution center caps weeks of complaints by township officials that illegal workers have taken jobs away from local residents and driven down the starting pay to $6.50 an hour,” wrote the Wilkes-Barre Times Leader.

The newly opened 105-acre facility plans to hire 1,200 workers in the next three years. Township supervisors say T.J. Maxx promised starting wages of $8-$10 an hour. State and local property taxes were waived for the first 10 years, a move now opposed by many officials, including Anthony Attardo, Pittston Township Supervisor, who openly expresses his anti-immigrant views.

“People within (the center) tell me there are only 70 Americans (working there),” Attardo said, according to the Scranton Times. “Asked to define Americans, he said ‘someone born in the United States,’ and added, ‘The rest are foreigners.’”

Attardo said he favored “jobs that pay a fair wage to local native-born Northeastern Pennsylvanians.”

“Since when have they been concerned with better wages?” union representative Marion Nalaschi told Militant reporters.

On October 20, at a meeting of the Pittston Township supervisors, UNITE representatives accused the township police of profiling the workers and stopping them to ask for their green cards. “They don’t just ask for their license, registration, and insurance,” Nalaschi told the meeting, “They’re asking for green cards.”

Since the meeting, Nalaschi reported that another worker was stopped and asked for her green card. “She told the policeman that she was from Puerto Rico and was just as much a citizen as he was,” Nalaschi said. “The policeman told this worker that she was ‘getting cocky’ and gave her a ticket which she intends to fight.”

The October 30 Wilkes-Barre Times Leader printed a letter, titled “Contributions of Local Immigrants Should Be Source of Local Pride,” signed by individuals representing UNITE, Catholic Social Services, and several other religious institutions and colleges.  
 
 
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