The Immigrant Workers Union: Challenges Facing Low-Wage Immigrant Workers in Los Angeles

The campaign to establish a labor union at Assi Super, Inc. ("Assi Super"), one of Los Angeles Koreatown's largest supermarkets, began in July 2001, when eight Latino workers staged a brief walk-out action to protest cuts to their shifts that followed a pattern of unlawful employment practices. The eight employees walked down the street one block into the office of Korean Immigrant Workers Advocates (KIWA), where the Immigrant Workers Union (IWU) was born. The IWU was conceived as a new type of union-worker-led, community-based, and independent of the AFL-CIO. The IWU hoped to utilize collective bargaining after an election certified by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to improve working conditions at Assi Super, where violations of employment law were commonplace. Assi Super management swiftly reacted with an antiunion campaign employing common union-busting tactics, despite prohibition of such an approach under the National Labor Relations Act