Trump · Wired
How Meta Cafeteria Workers Took on ICE—and Landed
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As immigration agents raided factories and other workplaces across the United States last June, staff at a Meta café in Bellevue, Washington, made a pact: They would rally together if the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown affected any one of them.
Key facts
- A longtime software engineer at Amazon, for instance, donated $100, then added $500 after learning more about the “nightmare,” he says, speaking anonymously because of company rules regarding media
- Last year, over 60 percent of them asked Lavish and Meta to respect workers’ rights to form a union with Unite Here Local 8
- On February 24, a judge ordered the release of Mbengue’s brother
- But Lavish has allegedly campaigned against the workers through meetings, flyers, texts, and emails, according to Unite Here organizing director Sarah Jacobson
Summary
Under a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement program, federal authorities had detained Serigne, a Senegalese asylum seeker and the brother of dishwasher Abdoul Mbengue. Several the cooks, dishwashers, and front-of-house staff at the Meta café known as Crashpad are from Africa, the Caribbean, or Ukraine. In December, Mbengue’s colleagues launched a fundraising campaign to pay for the legal defense of his brother, who came to the US in 2023 to escape challenging circumstances in Senegal. A longtime software engineer at Amazon, for instance, donated $100, then added $500 after learning more about the “nightmare,” he says, speaking anonymously because of company rules regarding media interviews.