Fort Morgan workers accuse Cargill of federal employment discrimination

Cargill plant in Fort Morgan fired 150 workers — the majority of whom were Somali Muslim — during prayer dispute in December

Lawyers for about 130 Cargill workers involved in a workplace prayer dispute at a Fort Morgan meatpacking plant have filed EEOC complaints accusing the agribusiness giant of religious discrimination.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations and Rathod Mohamedbhai LLC, a Denver law firm that specializes in civil rights and employment law, filed the complaints with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, alleging violations of federal employment discrimination law, CAIR confirmed Monday.

Specifically, the complaints allege that the Cargill Meat Solutions plant in Fort Morgan violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which says employers must “reasonably accommodate” religious observance as long as it does not result in undue hardship for the business.

“Cargill informed their employees that they wouldn’t accommodate Muslim employees anymore,” Denver attorney Qusair Mohamedbhai said. “This is a dramatic change in how they did business.”

On Dec. 23, Cargill fired about 150 second-shift employees for violating the company’s attendance policy after they failed to call in or show up for work for three consecutive days.

The fired workers, the majority of whom are Somali Muslims, had been protesting what they saw as changes to Cargill’s accommodation of workplace prayer.

The company, for its part, has dismissed claims that its religious accommodation policy has changed, arguing that while reasonable efforts are made to accommodate employees, accommodation is not guaranteed every day.

Both employees who were fired and employees and supervisors who believe they were retaliated against for their support of the Muslim workers are represented in the EEOC complaints, Mohamedbhai said.

Complaints have also been filed against the union that represents workers at the Fort Morgan plant, Teamsters Local 455, with both the EEOC and the National Labor Relations Board.

“The Somali Muslims would love to go back to their jobs — just under the condition that Cargill will follow their responsibility under the law,” Mohamedbhai said.

To date, 10 of the 150 terminated workers have been rehired at the plant, a Cargill spokesman said.

Overall, more than 100 people have been hired at the plant since late December, some to fill vacancies created by the mass firing and others to fill openings due to routine attrition, spokesman Michael Martin said.

In early January, Cargill announced a change to its rehiring policyto allow employees fired for attendance violations or job abandonment to reapply 30 days after their termination date.

Previously, former employees had to wait six months to apply for possible rehiring.

Martin on Monday declined to comment on CAIR’s statement about the EEOC complaints.

The EEOC could not confirm or deny whether any Cargill complaints had been received or whether an investigation would be initiated.

Information about specific cases becomes public only if the commission elects to file a lawsuit, an action usually taken as a last resort, according to a spokeswoman.

Fellow Colorado meatpacker JBS USA is currently facing one such lawsuit, with the EEOC alleging “wide-scale religious discrimination”and retaliation against Muslim employees during Ramadan in 2008.

In that case, about 100 Muslim workers at the JBS meatpacking plant in Greeley were fired after they did not report to work in protest of the company’s refusal to give them a prayer break at sundown during the Islamic holy month.

During Ramadan, observant Muslims fast during the day, praying and breaking their fast at sunset.

A judge in July denied JBS’s request to dismiss the claims against the company, clearing the way for the case to proceed to trial.

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