Thread: Workers Demand Illegals Be Exempt from Background Checks

http://www.ocregister.com/news/uci-2360 ... ested.html

There was a protest at UCI today (University of CA, Irvine) over the issue of them wishing to bring the janitor services in house. If they do so, the workers they hire must go through the standard background check that all UCI employees have to go through. The problem arises because the background check will reveal the immigration status of the worker. That's what the protest is all about. The workers are fearful they will not pass the immigration portion of the background check and then they will lose their jobs. They are demanding that UCI forgo the background checks on the janitors, in order to get around this.

Please be sure to leave your comments on the OCRegister's story at the end of it.

Pass this story around to your email lists in order for the rest of the country to see what is coming their way.

I wonder what percentage of the janitors are here illegally? I bet it is a large percent or the union would not be protesting..

When will the arrogance ever end?? These people just don't want to get it.
Suppose to make special favors for them.

I'm going to go set something on fire, then protest when the police come to arrest me for arson. The country is upside down. Also, notice in the article how they were protesting for more financial aid for undocumented students...

Are you kidding me? Just one look at the Violent Crimes Institute tells me we shouldn't waiver on this one. As usual the illegals want special treatment.

Here is the article as some members do not want to click on source links:


Published: Feb. 24, 2010
Updated: 9:23 p.m.
17 arrested in UCI protest
By ALEX BERGJANS AND IAN HAMILTON
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
COMMENTS 122
A sit-in protest led to the arrest of 17 people at UC Irvine on Wednesday, two weeks after 11 students were arrested on suspicion of disrupting the speech of the Israeli ambassador to the United States.

The protesters sat on the fifth-floor hallway of the administration building in front of the office of UCI Chancellor Michael Drake, who wasn't in his office Wednesday. Student protesters distributed and referred to a list of 12 demands the group wants Drake to address.

UCI police began arresting students and workers one at a time after they refused to leave UCI's adminstration building. The protestors held the sit-in protest outside the office of the school's chancellor on behalf of 150 outsourced UCI workers.

In their list, the students demanded the university end "exploitive labor practices," increase financial aid for lower income and undocumented students and eliminate what some protesters referred to as "institutional and systematic discrimination" of minority and underrepresented students.

At one point protesters blocked the entrances to the administration building, which was evacuated for the day. After the arrests, roughly 50 protesters knocked over two dumpsters, danced, chanted, and blocked traffic along nearby Pereira Drive in an impromptu reaction to police and university action.

Fourteen students and three workers were arrested and cited on suspicion of unlawful assembly and it is now up to the district attorney to decide whether to charge and prosecute the protesters, said university spokeswoman Cathy Lawhon.

One of the factors leading to the protest was a breakdown in negotiations between UC Irvine and the UC system's janitorial union. The union was seeking to "insource" janitorial and maintenance jobs which are contracted to American Building Maintenance (ABM) industries.

The negotiations broke down because UCI management wanted to impose citizenship checks on the workers, said Jorge Olvera, a groundskeeper at UC San Diego and executive vice president of service for the local chapter of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), which represents janitorial employees in the UC system.

"It's unfair, some of these employees have been working for UCI for years. They deserve the same benefits as regular UC employees," Olvera said.

According to Lawhon, UCI has twice been asked by the union to hold off beginning the "insourcing" process, which would bring the jobs in-house at the university. As part of that process, UCI would do background checks, Lawhon said, not "citizenship" checks.

"There's a requirement that university employees have a background check. If you were not in the country legally, that would come up," Lawhon said.

ABM Industries was asked Wednesday whether the company does background checks when hiring employees.

"We do comply with all state and federal laws regarding employment eligibility and verification," said ABM spokesman Tony Mitchell.

When asked whether that means background checks, Mitchell referred to his previous statement.

Campus police and officers from the Irvine Police Department responded when protesters began chanting, clapping, and banging their fists against the walls of the fifth-floor hallway around 9:30 a.m. After warning and asking protesters to exit the hallway, UCI police officers arrested the 17 people.

"I would've been pleased if the chancellor had come out to meet the protesters," said Frank Wilderson, professor of African American studies and drama at UCI who was present for the sit-in and acted as a "legal observer."

"The police were there in ridiculously large numbers, and there was no cause for [the protesters] to be arrested," he said. "The university should've met the demonstration with a dialogue about the demands. The university's reaction and police presence criminalizes what was a legitimate response."

Ryan Davis, a UCI student and one of the 17 arrested, described the protest as an attempt to force Drake to listen to their demands.

"The administration has no choice but to engage," said Davis, "They need to make some changes; we need solutions not more talking."

As a result of the protest, all the employees in the administration building were sent home for the day. English and drama major Victor Vasquez needed to sort out a financial aid problem at the building today but wasn't able to.

"I'm frustrated. It's the only time I can go to financial aid and talk about the $600 that is missing from a transfer," said Vasquez. "I'm a double major. I have a job and I don't have time to go check and figure out why I'm missing $600. I only had time today because my class was cancelled."

http://www.ocregister.com/news/uci-2360 ... ested.html

I have read that janitorial jobs in California previously were held primarily by African American citizens who had unionized among themselves and required decent wages and benefits for this work. As in other businesses across the country, illegal aliens have been encouraged to come in so that lower wages can be paid and "benefits" thrown upon the American taxpayer.

Just think of all those student records with Social Security numbers, names, date of birth=====JACKPOT FOR ILLEGAL WORKERS!!!!