The heated illegal immigration debate has echoed through the halls of the U.S. Congress and into America’s Main Streets with singular fervor of late.
Inevitably, the wrangling has focused on the economy, with critics arguing illegal immigrants steal jobs from U.S. citizens, while immigration proponents counter that undocumented perform jobs that most Americans are unwilling to do.
American businesses, it must be noted – particularly those in agriculture, construction and manufacturing – have benefited most from the illegal immigration’s byproduct: cheap labor. But fearful of government reprisal and public outcry, businesses have kept from speaking out about immigration policy.
Which makes one company’s recent advertising campaign all the more startling.
Retail giant American Apparel, long associated with sexually brazen advertisements, ventured into the immigration clash full force when it placed quarter-page ads in the Los Angeles Times and New York Times.
American Apparel C.E.O. Dov Charney, himself an immigrant from Canada, placed a quarter page ad in the New York Times on Dec. 21. The ad, featuring a Hispanic American Apparel employee, underlined the plight of an estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants in the United States.
The ads say current U.S. immigration policy amounts to an “apartheid system” that should be revamped.
"Let me be clear who makes our clothes. It is a collaboration between American-born people and non-American-born people," he told the New York Times. "I don't think supporting immigration reflects negatively on my brand, and in fact, it makes it look like we're a responsible business."
American Apparel has won over a sizeable share of customers – industry critics, too – with its “responsible” labor practices. At a time when other major retailers have outsourced their manufacturing to the third world, enticed by cheap labor, American Apparel has remained planted in the United States, sweatshop free.
The company’s 800,000 square-foot location in downtown Los Angeles is the nation’s largest garment factory. C.E.O. Dov Charney pays his workers – 90 percent of them are Latino, according to the Los Angeles Times – almost twice the California minimum wage and offers health insurance for $8 a week, both rarities on the bottom rung of the U.S. labor market. Additionally, American Apparel offers workers free English lessons and provides well-lighted and well-ventilated working areas.
Charney stresses that his workers have to present legitimate documentation to verify U.S. residency.
“Everybody is documented here,” Charney told the Los Angeles Times in 2006. “If you ask me to speculate, I think over 50 percent of the workers in my industry are falsely documented.”
An unabashed proponent of more lenient immigration laws, Charney has supported a change in immigration policy in the past, albeit through ads in smaller publications.
“My vision would be a very liberal immigration policy,” he told the Los Angeles Times. “I think we have to have a wholesale amnesty, one shot. I don’t believe in any restrictions on exit or entry to the United States.”
To that end, American Apparel is urging its employees to consider immigration policy when they vote in the upcoming presidential elections. In a recent company email, as reported by the Web site Politico.com, Charney urged workers to vote for either Barack Obama or John McCain.
“Why?” the email reads. “Because of their honesty on the issue of immigration, the most significant civil rights concern the country has faced in 50 years.”
“Why not Clinton?” the missive continues. “We appreciate Senator Clinton’s campaign on many fronts, but when it comes to the issue of immigration she has not shown the same strength and conviction as Obama.”
