100 Muslim workers were laid off by the Greeley, Colorado JBS Swift & Co. meatpacking plant Wednesday. Friday, about 400 Muslim workers walked out of the plant to protest the company?s treatment of their Ramadan prayers. Workers said that supervisors gave them time to break their fast and to pray during the beginning of Ramadan, but cracked down after other workers complained. On Tuesday, Swift warned those who had not yet returned that they faced immediate termination. Many returned only to find that termination notices had already been issued. The United Food and Commercial Workers Union, Local 7, has said that it intends to fight the layoffs, saying that the workers were not given ample warning to return to work, and that the offense was not a terminable one in the first place.
See "Colorado Meatpacking plant lays off 100 Muslim workers", Nicholas Riccardi, Los Angeles Times, September 10, 2008