Labor rallies for legalizing immigrants

Wednesday, Aug. 22, 2001 | 8:42 a.m.

While Andy Duangrudeeswat, from Thailand, stir-fried some shrimp, Adnan Mulhametovic, from Bosnia, spoke about spending seven years as an undocumented worker in Germany.

Both are now legal residents of the United States. They are also members of the Culinary Union and were at the Fremont Street Experience Tuesday as part of a nationwide series of rallies held by organized labor to push for legalizing the country's millions of undocumented workers.

The rallies displayed what Glenn Arnodo, political director for the Culinary Union, described as a reversal of labor's historical position, where immigrants were seen as lowering wages for American workers. But now unions are seeing more and more immigrants in their own ranks, some of them undocumented.

At least 40 percent of the 50,000 members of the Culinary Workers are Hispanic, Arnodo said.

The AFL-CIO has announced support for legalization of undocumented workers, a policy that led to the Las Vegas event and 21 others nationwide, including in Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and Chicago.

Labor is lobbying President Bush to go beyond changes to temporary or guest visas that the president has suggested, saying that these changes do not fix the instability in the national economy caused by having millions of undocumented people in the workforce.

D. Taylor, staff director for Culinary Local 226, said labor wants legalization for immigrant workers from all countries, not just Mexico, as President Bush also has suggested.

"Our workforce here in Las Vegas comes from more than 30 countries, as you can see here today," Taylor said, motioning to the workers at the rally.

"We can't leave any out."