Migrants living in homeless shelters on LA’s Skid Row are being hired to replace striking hotel workers

Hotels in Los Angeles have hired unhoused migrants, including teenagers, to replace striking workers, according to a scathing new report.

The union Unite Here Local 11, which represents striking LA hotel workers, claims newly arrived asylum seekers staying at a Skid Row shelter have been hired to work as cleaners in the city’s hotels.

More than 15,000 hotel workers in LA have gone on intermittent strikes since July, affecting about 50 hotels in Southern California. The workers are demanding better wages, benefits and working conditions.

Following the claims, the district attorney has opened an investigation into labor practices at LA hotels. DA George Gascon said Monday he is concerned about possible wage theft and violations of child labor laws.

Nearly a dozen asylum seekers — mostly from Venezuela and Colombia — told the LA Times they had been accepted into hotels where workers were protesting outside.

The hotels reportedly hiring migrants include Four Points by Sheraton, Le Meridien Delfina Santa Monica and the Holiday Inn LAX

DA George Gascon said at a press conference with the union and migrants on Monday that he is concerned about possible wage theft and violations of child labor law

Some of the migrants hired by hotels are reportedly just teenagers – the LA Times spoke to a 17-year-old student at Belmont High School who said she missed two days of school to clean rooms at the Holiday Inn LAX, where his mother also works as a housekeeper.

The boy said they were paid through Zelle by an agency called Arya Staffing Services Inc.

Migrants who spoke to the LA Times claimed they were given heavy loads, long hours and forced to work without breaks. The newspaper reported that some were told they would be paid $19 an hour, but others were given no information about how much they would earn.

Hotels reportedly hiring migrants include Four Points by Sheraton, Le Meridien Delfina Santa Monica and the Holiday Inn LAX.

Asylum seekers are not legally allowed to work for 150 days after submitting their application, but Venezuelans were recently granted temporary protected status and work permits as the Biden administration looks for ways to ease the migrant crisis.

Once their claims are approved, refugees and asylum seekers are allowed to work – and employers are allowed to hire replacement workers during labor strikes. However, unions condemn it as slave labor.

‘If there are violations of the law, there will be serious consequences. We want to ensure that our community understands that there will be no tolerance for the exploitation of refugees,” Gascon said on Monday.

Unite Here organizer Hannah Petersen told the LA Times that some of the migrants hired at Le Meridien Delfin were sent to LA by Texas Governor Greg Abbott, who has been ferrying asylum seekers to progressive cities to make a point about the Democrats’ open borders policy. .

Los Angeles Deputy Mayor Zach Seidle said a plan was put in place earlier this year for the arrival of migrants in the city, which was activated as soon as they were notified of the bus.

Abbott has claimed responsibility for sending more than 45,000 people to a half-dozen “sanctuary” cities, including New York and Chicago.

In August, the LA City Council asked if the city could sue Texas over the bus program. However, as The New York Times reports, the city has a robust shelter system that is used to handling a large number of migrants coming from the US-Mexico border.

But other cities receiving the buses have become overwhelmed by the flow of asylum seekers, with state governments in New York, Massachusetts and Illinois saying they have run out of space and pleading with the federal government for help.

Many of the migrants are staying at the Union Rescue mission on Skid Row

Skid Row in Los Angeles, pictured above

Last week, Massachusetts Governor Maura Healy announced that the state is “on the verge of reaching capacity” and will not guarantee housing for migrants, as more than 7,000 are currently in shelters.

The Democrat warned that the statewide emergency family shelter system will reach capacity by the end of the month, saying it has been expanding at an unsustainable pace to meet the demand of newly arrived migrant families.

Other states and cities have also struggled to find shelter for migrants.

New York Mayor Eric Adams first welcomed migrants sent north by Republican Governor Greg Abbot, who argues that progressive cities should share the costs of what he sees as Democratic policies with open borders.

In August 2022, the mayor told reporters, “As mayor of New York, I have to provide services to families who are here, and that’s what we’re going to do – our responsibility as a city, and I’m proud that this is a Right to Shelter -state, and we will continue to do so.’

But the buses kept coming, and a year later, Adams is advocating for federal and state aid. He is asking a judge to suspend the Right to Shelter policy as the city struggles to find space for the 120,000 asylum seekers who have arrived since spring 2022. .

Adams has also limited the number of days adults and families can stay in city shelters.

In May, he made major changes to the city’s 40-year-old Right to Shelter law, which guarantees a bed for anyone who needs one, as his administration asked for federal and state help to deal with the surge of migrants which he now says could destroy New York as we know it.

“This issue will destroy New York City,” Adams has said of the influx of asylum seekers.

Migrants who spoke to the LA Times claimed they were given heavy loads, long hours and forced to work without breaks

More than 15,000 LA hotel workers have been on intermittent strikes since July, affecting about 50 hotels in Southern California

Governor Kathy Hochul, who also welcomed asylum seekers for the first time last year, supports the city’s efforts to suspend a unique legal agreement that requires homeless people to be given emergency housing.

“I don’t know how the right to shelter – intended to help those people that I believe in, to help families – can or should be interpreted as an open invitation to the eight billion people who live on this planet, that if you let see on the streets of New York, that the city of New York has an obligation to provide you with a hotel room or shelter,” the Democrat said.

In Chicago, Governor JB Pritzker and Mayor Brandon Johnson wrote a letter to President Biden saying the situation has overwhelmed the city and its ability to help the asylum seekers. They are asking the federal government for financial help and a waiver of migrant work permit fees.

Chicago has received more than 18,000 migrants in a year, and the city’s leaders have warned of an unfolding humanitarian crisis. Officials say the number of daily arrivals in the Windy City has increased tenfold in recent weeks.

Asylum seekers sleep in airports and police stations because the shelters of the reception city run out of space.

Like New Yorkers, Chicagoans have resisted turning landmarks into emergency shelters, with some even asking city officials to close the city’s borders, while Mayor Johnson quietly signed a $29 million contract with a security firm to build base camps for migrants.

Meanwhile, the Biden administration backtracked on its rejection of a border wall.

In a shocking announcement, the Department of Homeland Security said it is waiving 26 federal laws to begin building a new “physical barrier” started under Donald Trump.