Lynda Waddington posted an interesting story at Iowa Independent about a unanimous U.S. Supreme Court ruling announced yesterday. The decision may become an issue at confirmation hearings if President Barack Obama takes Senator Tom Harkin’s advice and nominates Stephanie Rose for U.S. attorney in Iowa’s Northern District.

More on this story is after the jump.

Last year at this time I was scrambling to make as many phone calls and knock on as many doors as I could before the Iowa caucuses on January 3.

This week I had a little more time to reflect on the year that just ended.

After the jump I’ve linked to Bleeding Heartland highlights in 2008. Most of the links relate to Iowa politics, but some also covered issues or strategy of national importance.

I only linked to a few posts about the presidential race. I’ll do a review of Bleeding Heartland’s 2008 presidential election coverage later this month.

You can use the search engine on the left side of the screen to look for past Bleeding Heartland diaries about any person or issue.

Can’t say I’m too surprised. The Des Moines Register has the story.

The Des Moines Register has the news about the Iowa Labor Commissioner’s civil fine against Agriprocessors, which operates a meat-packing plant in Postville:

The fines and violations include:

• $339,700 for illegally deducting “sales tax/miscellaneous” costs 3,397 times. The state said that 1,073 Agriprocessors employees were affected by the unauthorized deductions reducing their pay by $72,189.09.

• $9,643,600 for illegally deducting a charge for frocks. State officials said this deduction occurred in 96,436 separate incidences. State officials said that 2,001 workers had their wages illegally reduced by $192,597.

• $4,900 for failing to pay 42 workers their last paychecks on May 16 and May 23 following the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raid in early May. In addition, seven workers were shorted two paychecks because of the overlapping nature of pay periods, the state said.

The fines total $9.98 million.

Officials also said Agriprocessors owes $264,786.45 in back wages to workers.

Agriprocessors may face other criminal or civil penalties in connection with various investigations related to the May 12 raid of the Postville plant. The Iowa Attorney General’s Office has already filed criminal charges against Agriprocessors for alleged violations of child labor laws.

Congressman Bruce Braley has been trying for months to find out how much the May 12 immigration raid in Postville cost the government. Today his office released this statement:

Braley Gets Answers from ICE on Cost of Postville Raid, Receives Full Accounting of Initial Costs

Washington,  DC -In response to his formal request, Rep. Bruce Braley (D, Iowa) received a full accounting of the initial costs incurred by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) during the May 12, 2008 raid at the Agriprocessors Plant in Postville, Iowa.  Braley has sent repeated letters to ICE requesting a full accounting of the costs to taxpayers associated with the raid at the Agriprocessors plant in  Postville , Iowa .

“It’s important that my constituents in  Iowa and all  U.S. taxpayers know how their tax dollars are being spent,” Braley said.  “I’m glad that ICE has begun to share information with taxpayers, so they can see for themselves how their tax dollars are being used to enforce our immigration laws.  I’ll continue pushing to ensure that taxpayers know how every dollar is being spent.”

The costs associated with ICE’s initial enforcement action are below.  The official document from ICE is attached to this message.

I’m not able to get that chart properly formatted, but here’s how the costs of “Operation Cedar Valley Junction” break down.

The Office of Investigation costs (which relate to the initial enforcement action) are $2,803,265. Line items:

$1,578,004 for Temporary Duty Assignment Cost for 750 ICE Office of Investigations Personnel

$60,117 for Transportation of Equipment, etc.

$268,483 for Lease of Cattle Congress Facility and Modspace Trailers

$744,747 for Leased Services (Security Work Authorization with Federal Protective Service, electrician)

$65,389 for Supplies (electrical, office, operational, ID, custody)

$74,481 for Misc. Equipment (computer switch)

$12,044 Document Exploitation (DocEx), Under Cover

The Office of Detention and Removal Costs so far have been $2,441,642. Line items:

$495,697 for Temporary Duty Assignment Cost for 281 ICE Detention and Removal Personnel

$1,905,750 for Leased Services, KBR (formerly Kellogg Brown & Root), shower trailers, latrines, detainment at Cattle Congress, processing, physical security, detainee meals

$40,195 for Supplies (cuffs / custody, property)

The official document from Immigration and Customs Enforcement concludes:

These are the known Office of Investigations costs as of October 1, 2008.  This investigation is still ongoing and incurring additional expenses.

These are the known Office of Detention and Removal costs as of October 6, 2008.  This investigation is still ongoing and incurring additional expenses.

The Des Moines Register noted that the $5.2 million figure does not include costs incurred to the U.S. Department of Labor or the U.S. attorney’s office in Cedar Rapids. The Register report included this as well:

Scott Frotman, a spokesman for the United Food and Commercial Workers, a union that has attempted to organize Agriprocessors’ workers, was critical of the Postville raid. He said it covers up the fact that the Bush administration has done nothing to fix what he called a broken immigration system.

“The Agriprocessors’ raid cost taxpayers millions of dollars, it raised serious due process issues, and it may have compromised federal investigations into labor abuses by the company’s management,” Frotman said.

U.S. Rep. Steve King, an Iowa Republican, disagreed. He said immigration laws must be enforced, regardless of the expense to taxpayers.

“If we start saying, ‘Well, it costs too much money to enforce the law,’ then we will see more and more of these radical, pro-illegal immigration activists drive more wedges between us and make it harder to enforce the law,” King said.

I see no evidence that large-scale raids such as that in Postville or earlier at the Swift plant in Marshalltown do anything to reduce illegal immigration. But I’m not surprised that King is for heavy-handed actions that punish immigrants without changing much about corporate hiring practices.

Meanwhile, Lynda Waddington just wrote this piece for Iowa Independent about how the raid adversely affected life in Postville.

The Iowa Attorney General’s office on Tuesday charged the Agriprocessors meat-packing facility with more than 9,000 child labor law violations involving 32 minors. The owner and four Agriprocessors employees were named in the charges. A spokesman for the company said the children had lied about their ages, so the company was not at fault.

The Des Moines Register quoted Attorney General Tom Miller as saying the action will not force the closure of the Postville plant. However, I wouldn’t be too sure of that if the Orthodox Union follows through on its warning to withdraw its kosher supervision from Agriprocessors unless new management is installed at the company and at the Postville plant.

I can’t overstate the importance of the Orthodox Union’s kosher certification to Agriprocessors’ business. The overwhelming majority of its customers would refuse to buy any meat lacking the “U” symbol from the Orthodox Union.

Incidentally, Congressman Bruce Braley issued a statement praising Miller’s office for prosecuting alleged child labor offenses.

Congressman Tom Latham (whose district includes Postville) released no statement, in keeping with his pattern of saying little about Agriprocessors since a federal immigration raid turned the spotlight on the company in May.

The owners of Agriprocessors have invited Governor Chet Culver to visit the Postville meat-packing plant he strongly criticized in his guest editorial for the Sunday Des Moines Register.

The invitation was part of a guest commentary from Agriprocessors, which the Register published on Monday. In that piece, the company’s plant manager, Chaim Abrahams, denied most of the allegations concerning labor and safety violations at the plant.

Culver’s office said the governor will not accept the invitation.

In related news, someone asked Barack Obama about the federal raid at the Agriprocessors plant when he was in Davenport on Monday, and he was quite critical of alleged use of child labor without mentioning Agriprocessors by name. An attorney for Agriprocessors issued an angry response to Obama’s comments. The company’s owners have donated primarily to Republican politicians in the past.

Governor Chet Culver took the unusual step of publishing a guest editorial in the Sunday Des Moines Register about alleged wrongdoing at the Agriprocessors meat-packing plant in Postville:

The sad events surrounding the [May 12] federal Postville raid, resulting in multiple federal criminal-law convictions of line workers and low-level supervisors – and, notably, not yet of the company’s owners – are strong evidence of a company that has chosen to take advantage of a failed federal immigration system.

[…]

Before the federal raid, Agriprocessors already had a history of sanctions by Iowa’s state regulatory agencies for water pollution, as well as health and safety law violations. Alarming information about working conditions at the Postville plant – including allegations ranging from the use of child labor in prohibited jobs to sexual and physical abuse by supervisors; from the nonpayment of regular and overtime wages to the denial of immediate medical attention for workplace injuries – brought to national attention by the raid forces me to believe that, in contrast to our state’s overall economic-development strategy, this company’s owners have deliberately chosen to take the low road in its business practices.

He said he had directed members of his cabinet to make sure Iowa law is being enforced with Agriprocessors. Furthermore, open positions at Agriprocessors may not be included on state job-listing services “due to the unsafe working conditions at the Postville facility.” In addition, he called on Attorney General Tom Miller “promptly to prosecute all alleged criminal and civil-law violations that are backed by sufficient evidence.”

On Friday the Iowa Division of Labor Services released a statement citing 31 new and repeated safety violations at Agriprocessors’ plant in Postville.

If any Bleeding Heartland readers keep kosher, you may be interested in this piece by Lynda Waddington for Iowa Independent. She describes a “kosher social seal” program, which signifies that food not only meets Jewish ritual requirements but has also been produced in a humane and socially responsible manner.

Meanwhile, John Carlson reports in his latest Des Moines Register column that a local radio personally has written lyrics called “Palau to Postville – a Topical/Tropical Tale.” They are meant to be sung to the tune of the Gilligan’s Island theme. He was inspired by “reports last week that an employment recruiter has been trying to entice people in the Pacific island of Palau to come to work for the [Agriprocessors] plant.”

UPDATE: A spokesman for Agriprocessors says the company is drafting “a forceful response to the governor’s guilty verdict even before trial.”

The same article goes on to say:

Several business and political experts said Culver’s criticism was unusual, but they applauded it.

“I think it’s out of the ordinary. But then again, I think Agriprocessors is a little out of the ordinary, too,” said Mike Ralston, president of the Iowa Association of Business and Industry.

Ralston’s group includes most large Iowa employers, but not Agriprocessors. He said he wouldn’t want Culver to make a habit of publicly criticizing specific businesses. However, he said Agriprocessors’ notoriety has damaged the state’s reputation, making it fair game for the governor’s ire.

I agree with Congressman Bruce Braley that federal agencies need to investigate Agriprocessors, the company operating the meatpacking plant in Postville where nearly 400 workers were detained during an immigration raid on Monday.

It is hard to believe that a company could be unaware that some 40 percent of its workforce may consist of illegal immigrants.

Click the link about to read Lynda Waddington’s whole report for Iowa Independent. Here is a particularly important passage:

“Until we enforce our immigration laws equally against both employers and employees who break the law, we will continue to have a problem with illegal immigration,” Braley said.

According to Braley, just three employers were fined for breaking immigration laws in 2004. Last year, following Bush administration promises “to make employer enforcement a priority,” Braley says 92 employers were arrested, but only 17 fined out of the six million employers in the U.S.

“Naturally, the sheer number of arrests made by ICE during Monday’s raid raises questions about Agriprocessors, Inc.’s knowledge of possible violations of employment and immigration law.”

For his efforts, Braley received the same answer as members of the media have received when asked about a possible or ongoing investigation. “Federal officials would not comment on the possibility of an investigation into Agriprocessors for possible violations of the law,” he said Wednesday evening.

An official at the Iowa Labor Commission has confirmed that Agriprocessors was under investigation for possible child labor and wage law violations at the time of the raid. No one would comment on the possible impact the raid would have that investigation.

On a related note, I completely agree with this letter to the editor, which the Des Moines Register published on Thursday:

From the May 13 paper, “Orthodox Jews…gather across from the Postville plant.” “Ari Berkowitz, a 15-year-old Hasidic Jew, was hanging out with a handful of friends.”

I trust that we will also be seeing captions such as “Southern Baptists watch a baseball game,” and “Jane Doe, a Pentecostalist from West Des Moines, was at the mall yesterday.”

– Sondra Krueger Feldstein, Bondurant

When the Swift plant was raided in Marshalltown last year, media reports didn’t go out of their way to identify the owners and operators of the plant as Methodist, Catholic, or whatever.

Calling attention to the religion of the Agriprocessors’ owners may give the misleading impression that their faith was related to possible legal violations.