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Primex Farms & COVID-19: Background & Chronology

Primex Farms, LLC describes itself as a “grower, processor and international trader and exporter of nuts and dried fruits” that is “vertically integrated in Pistachios” and owns “over 5,000 acres of Pistachio orchards in California.” The workers involved are at Primex’s large pistachio and almond processing facility in Wasco, Calif. The Wasco facility provides mostly year-round employment for approximately 400 packing shed workers and outside employees who work in silos at the same location.

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Late May-early June 2020—Some Primex employees begin showing symptoms of the novel coronavirus. The company’s response to initial COVID-19 cases is to deny any employees tested positive for the virus. When employees go to the company office in early June to ask if some workers are infected, they are told that it is just rumors. Some employees who are infected are advised by Primex to keep it confidential and not to share it with anyone else.

Employees requesting face masks are told that unless they are allergic, the company cannot provide them with masks. Several employees attest that the company is selling face masks for $8 each in its office during May 2020.

June 10, 2020—Primex fires Jesse Salazar, a worker who it blames for infecting the other workers at the plant after he returns from visiting family members outside of the country. That same day, Maria Hortencia Lopez and other employees stop working after exhibiting symptoms.  She subsequently dies on July 14, 2020.

As more and more Primex workers test positive for the virus, some of them request leaves of absence out of fear that they could become ill. Some employees are told they can resign or take time off, but know their jobs are not secure and they can be replaced. Some workers who test positive continue working out of worry over forfeiting their livelihood. By this time, California Governor Gavin Newsom has issued an executive order requiring all food industry employers to provide two weeks paid sick leave for infected or exposed workers.

June 22, 2020—Employees reach out to the UFW, asking for the union’s help in dealing with the company and issues involving COVID-19.

June 23, 2020—A worker reaches out to the press and a story runs on a local television news station. Primex confirms 31 employees have tested positive. At that point, some workers are dismayed to report that it is from rumors and news accounts—and not from the company—that they learn their co-workers are infected with the coronavirus.

June 25, 2020—Protesting Primex’s flawed response to the virus, employees walk out on strike and picket outside the Wasco facility displaying red UFW black-eagle flags and hand-lettered signs. Workers are requesting safety measures, including social distancing procedures, company provision of personal protective equipment such as face masks and payment of sick leave for infected or exposed employees. Local news organizations also report workers are demanding better communication and transparency from the firm. Primex fires the leader of a group of workers that goes to the company office to complain about unsafe conditions and to object to someone at the office selling face masks for $8 each, according to workers. Workers who have tested positive for the virus or suspect they are infected also report they have not received COVID-19 paid sick leave despite the state requirement and some say they are having to draw upon accumulated vacation or sick hours.

Since the one-day strike, Primex workers have continued their activism, including speaking with the press as the coronavirus has continued spreading among company employees. Many of these workers are quoted and prominently featured in news coverage.

June 26, 2020—Primex announces it will shut down the facility to perform a deep cleaning against the coronavirus. However, workers say that instead of engaging an outside professional deep-cleaning firm, all the company does is conduct a regularly scheduled in-house fumigation against pests using in-house workers who themselves could be exposed to COVID-19. Primex disputes this, but workers insist that no deep cleaning has occurred. Primex also announces it will contract with a mobile clinic for COVID-19 testing of its employees.

June 29, 2020—In a statement issued to the press the company promises to pay all workers for all the time they have lost whether they tested positive or have symptoms. According to workers, the company has since failed to make good on this promise. Workers also confirm that Primex has failed to pay all employees for the time they have been unable to work under the federal CARES Act as well as the state executive order issued by Governor Newsom mandating two weeks of paid sick leave. Employees, including even those who have already tested positive, are called in by Primex to take tests at its mobile clinic.

July 6, 2020—Primex workers once again demonstrate outside the company’s facility while prominently featuring UFW flags.

July 7, 2020—A worker at Primex since 2017, Marielos del Carmen Cisneros is a production clerk whose job is to produce labels and verify their accuracy on containers. She is one of the most vocal and visible worker leaders and union supporters since June 2020, active in both the June 25 and July 6 demonstrations at the company and speaking with news outlets. Primex targets Cisneros, interrogating her over her union activities and comments to the press. She is removed from access to work equipment and job responsibilities. The company isolates and constructively discharges her on or about July 7, 2020.

July 8, 2020—Remigio Ramirez has been working at Primex as a maintenance worker for 13 years. He repeatedly tries to tell his supervisors he feels sick. “I started feeling sick like three days before [the diagnosis] and I asked my supervisor to let me go home and he said there was a lot of work and not enough employees…Now, most of us are infected, my wife, my daughter… What are we going to do?” Ramirez says management tells him that he is going to cause the company to shut down and that it will all be his fault.

Ramirez, who has always worked the day shift during his 13 years at Primex, is also a vocal and visible worker leader and union supporter since June 2020 and speaks with reporters. He participates in both the June 25 and July 6 protests in front of the facility, and at a UFW news conference the next week. Ramirez is repeatedly interrogated by management about his comments to the press and participation with the UFW. Ramirez is told to retract his criticisms of the company in the press and that he will be responsible if Primex goes bankrupt.

During more than 12 of his 13 years with the company Ramirez has always worked the day shift. On or about July 8, 2020, he is notified that starting August 1, 2020, he will be switched to the night shift, which is less desirable.

July 14, 2020— Primex employee Maria Hortencia Lopez, 57, is taken off life support and dies from the virus.

July 17, 2020—Carlos Gonzalez has been employed by Primex for eight months. He is an active and vocal supporter of protest activities at the company involving COVID-19 since June 2020, takes part in both the June 25 and July 6 demonstrations and has engaged with the media. Gonzalez is targeted and interrogated by Primex management and reassigned from forklift operator inside the packing shed to outdoor labor in the summer heat.

July 22, 2020—Primex worker Veronica Perez has worked at the company as a sorter since 2017. She is active and vocal in coronavirus-related activities by workers at Primex since June 2020, is at both the June 25 and July 6 protests and speaks with the press. As a result, she is targeted and interrogated at least twice, including on or about July 22, 2020. Management personnel tell Perez the company will have to close down, that it will be her fault and she is told to retract her statements to the media.

July 23, 2020—Company anti-union consultant Raul Calvo calls a meeting with 17 employees and advises them that all workers supplied to Primex by USA Staffing® will lose their jobs because Primex is discontinuing its contract with the employment service firm. Calvo says it is the UFW’s fault since the union has asked for an investigation of Primex’s faulty conduct involving COVID-19 by the California Attorney General’s office which, Calvo claims, has caused a loss of business and production.  The majority of USA Staffing® employees have been actively pressing their grievances with Primex and have been participating with the UFW. Some pro-company workers supplied to Primex through USA Staffing© are seen re-applying to work at Primex by turning to one of the other employment service agencies. When workers who have been protesting at Primex ask if they can apply with the other agency, Primex effectively communicates that they cannot.

Even though management claims lack of work is why Primex is cutting off USA Staffing®, the packinghouse has recently had to reduce the number of shifts because not enough employees are showing up out of fear of the virus. Primex hires new workers on the same day it announces the termination of USA Staffing® employees, who it allegedly let go because there was not enough work. On the following Monday, July 27, employees report more than 15 new workers are hired and have started working. Workers say they cannot remember when Primex has engaged in this kind of wholesale cutback.

July 24, 2020—The UFW and Primex workers file unfair labor practice charges against the company with the National Labor Relations Board alleging the company has illegally retaliated against its workers for engaging in legally protected concerted and union activities. The NLRB advises UFW attorneys it is expediting the investigation of the charges because they are COVID-19 related. The state Attorney General’s office also says it is investigating the workers’ allegations.

July 27, 2020—The UFW’s census of Primex workers shows 100 out of its packinghouse work force of 400 employees have tested positive for coronavirus as well as 49 of their adult family members and 34 children—for a total of 183 people connected with Primex, which employs 400 in its packinghouse. The company now acknowledges 150 of its packinghouse workers have tested positive.

Primex worker Eustodia Oropeza, 55, who tests positive, is removed from life support and sent home for palliative care; she is not expected to survive. Primex employee Maria Hortencia Lopez, 57, is taken off life support and dies from the virus on July 14.

United Farm Workers of America

July 31, 2020