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Ouano Tante worked the afternoon shift at the Tyson beef plant in Joslin, Illinois, for five years. But when she and hundreds of her co-workers arrived at work on August 14, they found the plant closed.

They speculated that someone on the morning shift might have gotten injured. Then two mid-level supervisors came outside in tears. Plant supervisors told workers the plant was closing permanently, effective immediately.

Inside, the early-morning shift had just ended when the workers were informed it would be their last. The cafeteria erupted into chaos. Plant supervisors stood guard by the doors, workers said, while everyone received their closure paperwork.

“People were crying, shaking,” Tante said. “When we were leaving the parking lot, there were so many car accidents. People were so upset.”

“They gave no reason, nothing,” said Ahoro Asselissime. “People have no job. No money to pay our bills. For 11 years, I made money for them. And now they’re not doing anything for me.”

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Disaster for Community

Joslin is home to just 56 residents. But 2,500 workers from Africa, Latin America, and Burma toiled at the meatpacking plant there, butchering cattle for Tyson, one of the world’s largest meatpacking companies. The workers were represented by United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 1546.

Most of the workers live in the Quad Cities, clustered around the Illinois-Iowa border 160 miles west of Chicago. Everyone there knows someone who works at Tyson, the area’s ninth-largest employer. The closure announcement sent the community into a tailspin.

Tante, originally from Togo, had the job of determining the age of cattle by checking the size of their teeth. An overhead conveyor would move carcasses, suspended by their ankles, along the chain. Tante checked the teeth, sprinted up a set of stairs to mark the cattle’s ankles with ink, then sprinted back down to catch the next carcass.

Simultaneously, other workers drained blood from the animal by slicing the neck with knives. If Tante didn’t work fast enough or was off-pace with the other workers, she said, she could get cut by their knives.

The laid-off workers will be paid for 36 hours a week until October, but that’s far less than they had been making with overtime.

“I got $500 this week,” said Asselissime. “My rent is $925. I have to put gas in my car, buy food for my kids. Everything is so expensive now.” Prior to the closure, Asselissime could expect around $900 a week.

“I’ve been sounding the alarm about how Tyson treats their workers for years,” said Nana Ouro-Agoro, founder of Akwaaba, a nonprofit organization that provides support to the Quad Cities’ immigrant population.

Originally from Togo, Ouro-Agoro came to the Quad Cities after winning the immigration lottery in 2008. She learned that many of her neighbors worked at Tyson, where they........

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