I.T. workers sue Disney; accuse the company of abusing H-1B visa program

[davidn3600]

At least 23 former Disney IT workers have filed complaints with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) over the loss of their jobs to foreign replacements. This federal filing is a first step to filing a lawsuit alleging discrimination.

These employees are arguing that they are victims of national origin discrimination, a complaint increasingly raised by U.S. workers who have lost their jobs to foreign workers on H-1B and other temporary visas.

Sara Blackwell, the Florida attorney representing the workers, says the deadline for Disney employees terminated on Jan. 30 for filing EEOC actions is Thursday.

These employees are making discrimination claims with the EEO under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, citing in part "hostile treatment in forcing the Americans to train their replacements." The claims include discrimination based on national origin and age.

Disney's layoff last January followed agreements with IT services contractors that use foreign labor, mostly from India. Some former Disney workers have begun to go public over the displacement process.

http://www.computerworld.com/article/3007933/it-careers/two-dozen-disney-it-workers-prepare-to-sue-over-foreign-replacements.html

The IT workers are also claiming Disney is in violation of Florida state employment discrimination laws and will file a claim in state court as well.

Unfortunately, our Democratic front runner is on the wrong side of this issue..

[TheFarseer]

1. I hope they win.

Anyone have any idea what their chances are? Does this ever happen? I haven't heard of it. Usually they force them to shut up and smile or no severance.

[TheBlackAdder]

2. I watched a show about how Disney controls most of the attorneys in Florida!

.


Something along the lines of that Sopranos episode where Tony contacted all of the Family Court lawyers in the area so his wife could not use them.

Supposedly, Disney would offer small jobs to many of the attorneys in the state, who were eager to have a business deal with Disney. But, that would be the only case they would get, so those attorneys could not file suits against the company, due to a conflict. Oh, I think that show came out around the same time that a South American girl got severely burned when one of those parade floats fell on her. It was mentioning how hard it would be for her to find a good attorney in the state.



This was well before Disney started shipping their profits, via E&Y, to Luxembourg to skip out on paying US taxes. (Just like Koch Ind.)


.

[appalachiablue]

6. How ugly, thanks for passing on this corruption Disney style, The American Way?

[Babel_17]

3. K&R in support

Keep it in the public eye.

[nilram]

4. ah, "our Democratic front runner" may have different meanings depending on who reads your post...

I know who I think it means, though. And you're wrong.

a-hahahah!

[jeff47]

5. Abuse of the H1B visa system?! Why that's not possible!!

After all, I read on DU how it's not at all possible to abuse the H1B visa system!!

There are safeguards! They exist even when people demonstrate how to bypass them!

[msongs]

7. h 1B program should be scrapped. raise wages and suddenly qualified people will appear nt

[stuffmatters]

8. Yep, and there's already plenty of skilled people here for those jobs

The "lack of Americans' skills" dodge is just corporate speak for "importing cheaper labor."

Bernie is pretty outspoken on this.

[Fuddnik]

9. And the Floriduh Democratic Party hold all of it's conventions at Disney.

And they have for as long as I can remember.

[cascadiance]

10. They should also take it to ISDS courts very publicly too once TPP is passed...

... and note how H-1B is costing us "persons" *lost profits* and that we deserve to have those lost profits paid back to us or have the laws changed.

Now if the courts say that we aren't corporations, tell them back that if corporations can conveniently be "persons" to have laws made for us to apply to them, then it seems like we should be able to be corporations as persons too in an equal fashion to get these "rights" that "corporate persons" get that we don't dammit!!!

If it is true that TPP removes the H-1B quotas, then we should DAMN WELL be able to sue for our lost profits!!!