Niraj Warikoo

Detroit Free Press

More than 20 Hispanic immigrant workers at an industrial plant in Macomb County say they were fired after they took part in the Day Without Immigrants protests in February.

And now, they are challenging their firings in a charge filed with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), saying they were unjustly fired by EZ Industrial Solutions in Chesterfield Township for taking part in a political protest. EZ Industrial Solutions said it acted appropriately.

►Related: Hundreds in metro Detroit protest on 'Day Without Immigrants'

►Related: ICE raids in Ypsilanti, Detroit cause anxiety among some immigrants

The case illustrates the challenges some immigrant workers face as the U.S. toughens immigration enforcement. And today, the issue is expected to spring to the fore again as many immigrants take part in rallies for immigrants scheduled in Detroit, Pontiac, Kalamazoo, Grand Rapids and other cities.

In the charge filed against EZ Industrial Solutions, the workers said that on Feb. 14, two days before the Feb. 16 Day Without Immigrant protests, "the employer coercively questioned employees about any potential plans to observe, support, or participate in demonstrations surrounding a 'Day Without Immigrants.'"

The charge alleges that on Feb. 15 the employer again questioned them, this time "threatening employees with a 1 week suspension for observing the 'Day Without Immigrants.'"

Instead of being suspended, though, about 20 workers who took part in the protests were fired, said the charge filed by attorney Tony Paris of the Sugar Law Center in Detroit. Some of the workers marched in rallies that day in metro Detroit, while others skipped work in protest.

After they were fired, a company supervisor threatened to report the workers to immigration authorities, the charge said.

"A worker said: a supervisor came to my house asking: 'How are you affording an attorney? Don't you know the company is going to send ICE, have ICE be involved?'" said Paris, referring to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the federal agency under the Department of Homeland Security that deals with immigration arrests and deportations.

According to the NLRB charge, EZ "maintains and enforces rules preventing employees from talking to one another about workplace conditions."

EZ's operations manager, Jordan Yoder, defended the company's actions, saying in an e-mailed statement to the Free Press: "The law is quite clear that employees can’t just not show up to work when they’re expected, and also that they are not free to participate in political, non-work related protests during their work day without consequences. We therefore deny any wrongdoing and are confident that the charge will be dismissed."

On its website, EZ Industrial Solutions says it "specializes in secondary operations for the automotive fastener and stamping industry. Our services include fastener vision sorting/hand sorting, fastener head painting, assemblies, and packaging/kitting."

The workers at EZ Industrial Solutions earned just above minimum wage, about $9 to $12 an hour, assorting screws and other small items, working an informal routine that allowed for absences, Paris said. He said the NLRB investigators interviewed the workers in a church, where they felt comfortable speaking out. Some may be undocumented immigrants.

The workers fired were all Latina female immigrants, except for one Latino immigrant worker who was male, said Paris. They live across metro Detroit and most have roots in Mexico and Central American countries. Paris said the workers may have been discriminated against because of their ethnicity. All of the supervisors are white except for a Hispanic woman who acts as an intermediary between the workers and managers, he said.

According to Paris, here's what happened to one of the workers who was fired and gave an affidavit:

She had worked at EZ for about 3 1/2 years, checking for defects in screws with the help of machines. She said she was only written up once in her career, for accidentally letting a part with a defect get through. Her shift was usually 5:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m.

The worker heard about the "Day Without Immigrants" protests and discussed it with her coworkers. Supervisors then started asking: Are you coming into work on that the day of the protest?

Some workers said yes, and the supervisor warned them they be laid off for a week if you do.

"The workers said, OK, whatever," Paris said, because they didn't mind being without work for a week.

"On the day of the protest, she left a message for her superiors that she could not make it to work," Paris said.

Usually, he said, workers don't communicate at all with supervisors about not showing up for work because they have an informal schedule.

"Workers wouldn't be punished for not calling in, because they don't have to do that anyway. ... The employer never cared. You could not go in for three days" and then show up and work.

The supervisor didn't respond to the worker's message, but when she came back the next day, the supervisor said she would be fired unless she could produce a doctor's note saying she was sick.

In the past, the company never asked for doctors' notes if someone called in sick, the worker said in her affidavit.

The dispute between workers and the Macomb County plant were echoed in other parts of the U.S. According to a report by NBC News, some companies in Oklahoma, Florida, Tennessee and New York fired workers for taking part in the protests.

A similar issue took place in Detroit in 2006, when Wolverine Packing Co. fired 21 meat cutters at a plant in Detroit because they took part in immigrant protests on March 28, the Free Press reported at the time. They were all Mexican immigrants, some of them undocumented. Wolverine later said it would rehire the workers after protests by workers and advocates over their firings.

Paris said the workers at EZ had a loose schedule in which they could drop in and offer to work after missing a few days. They didn't have a regular schedule, and so not showing up was never a grounds to be fired, he said. Moreover, he said, the company had warned they would be suspended for a week, not fired.

The NLRB is currently reviewing the charge and its Detroit office sent it to their office in Washington, D.C., for further review.

Contact Niraj Warikoo: 313-223-4792 or nwarikoo@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @nwarikoo.