In The News
Wells Fargo took US $$$ now refuses to fight for US jobs
By Dominique Paul Noth
Editor, Milwaukee Labor Press
Union members don’t have to wear their best “made in the USA” garments -- but keeping those garment jobs and American brands going is certainly the intention behind a special “call to protest“ at 12:30 p.m. Thursday, May 28, at the Target store at 1250 W. Sunset Dr. in Waukesha. The protest will be held at one of the entrance doors off the parking lot.
This call to action now adds local power to a national issue. The protest is organized by SEIU and Workers United Local 122, and supported by the state AFL-CIO and the Milwaukee Area Labor Council, as part of a nationwide campaign to preserve Hartmarx and its 3,600 employees.
Some 2,000 of those jobs are held by SEIU and Workers United. Hartmarx is best known for its Hart Schaffner & Marx and Hickey Freeman suits – 122 years as a noted American clothier.
The unions are urging the liquidated company’s chief creditor, Wells Fargo, to support the sale of Hartmarx to a buyer who would keep the company alive, even if some of the jobs continued overseas.
But Wells Fargo Chairman Richard Kovacevich has resisted keeping the company alive and jobs here despite complaints from members of Congress as well as unions. Kovacevich, who also called the federal stress test on his bank’s assets “asinine,” sits on the board of Target, which is holding an annual meeting at the Waukesha store. Which explains why Target seems the target, though it’s not.
The target is a bank that refuses the opportunity to keep Americans working even as it accepts tax money from working Americans.
Three days after supplying President Obama’s inauguration tuxedo, Hartmarx filed for bankruptcy, citing a plunge in its sales resulting in part from Wall Street’s credit freeze. But company officials also told the New York Times in May that the bankruptcy filing was forced after Wells Fargo reduced its credit line to $25 million while Hartmarx was carrying debt of about $144 million.
Yet at the same time Wells Fargo has been bailed out by taxpayers to the tune of $25 billion through TARP, the federal government’s troubled asset relief program.
Unions and elected officials have revealed at least three companies have approached Wells Fargo about buying, not liquidating, Hartmarx. Two of those companies have promised to retain many jobs in the US.
Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) has joined the union effort, telling the New York Times, “Wells Fargo ought to give them (these companies) the time they need to assemble a bid that would keep the workers working.”
Ruby Sims, president of the Workers United local at the Chicago area plant of Hartmarx, was less diplomatic: “If the banks are going to pull the plug and pull us down, we will fight. We’re going to do whatever it takes to keep our jobs.”
Hartmarx’s own executives want the brand to continue. “Brands that have been around for 100 years made by American craftsmen are highly desirable properties,” noted CEO Homi Patel. “There are several bidders” despite Wells Fargo’s resistance to listen to offers.
The rally at Target is designed to force common sense and put pressure on Kovacevich to prevent “Wells Fargo from liquidating a company for its own short term interest” when the purpose of the taxpayer bailout was to get credit moving and keep jobs going.
If the unions can’t get Wells Fargo’s attention at its own offices, it hopes to at Target or at Cargill or Cisco, where Kovacevich also sits on the boards. Incidentally, his total compensation packages after stepping out of a CEO role to become chairman, has been estimated at $52 million.
One congressman who has joined Schumer and Rep. Barney Frank in pressuring Wells Faro is Illinois Democrat Phil Hare, who actually worked as a cutter for 13 years at Hartmarx.
As US Rep. Hare noted for the Chicago Tribune, last year when “TARP recipient Bank of America cut off credit to Chicago-based Republic Windows and Doors, leading to the closure of its Goose Island plant, workers fought back. They staged a sit-in to secure the sick leave and vacation days they were owed. Their peaceful and courageous efforts gained them national prominence. Today that plant has reopened.”
As Hare says and the union protest in Waukesha underlines, “Wells Fargo should take a lesson from the Republic workers. Do the right thing. Allow Hartmarx to be bought by a company that will keep it open for another 120 years and continue to provide its workers with the dignity of a good-paying job.”
Workers United in Wisconsin represents all the Wisconsin locals previously part of UNITE HERE. For more information on the campaign to force Wells Fargo to listen, contact Christopher Rose at Workers United Local 122, (414) 271-0290