In the fall of 2020, a group of workers at a recycling company called United Scrap Metal were trying to form a union at their Philadelphia plant. The company hired a “union avoidance” firm called Chessboard Consulting in hopes of defeating the organizing campaign…

The firm sent a bilingual consultant named Mike Rosado to give the workers, who were mostly immigrants, second thoughts about a union. United Scrap provided Rosado with detailed spreadsheets listing each worker’s name and address… Many of the workers were deemed “completely illiterate.” …

Yet organizing immigrants comes with unique challenges…

…They would produce flyers equating the union with oppressive “dictators” from Latin America. …

…the beverage bottler Refresco retained the firm of Lupe Cruz, a former union organizer who’s been running campaigns against unions for years….

Cruz, who didn’t respond to an interview request, had previously been hired by former President Donald Trump’s Las Vegas hotel to counter a union campaign by housekeepers, many of them immigrants…

Workers at the tortilla maker El Milagro in Illinois organized a walkout at their factory in 2021 demanding the company address excessive heat and other safety concerns, according to employees. The company hired the labor consulting firm Government Resources Consultants of America…