World Cup Leverage: California Stadium Workers Win the Right to Strike Over ICE

In a World Cup-fueled union win, concessions workers at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles have won the right to walk off the job, should ICE pose a threat to their safety.

The stadium’s 2,000 cooks, bartenders, dishwashers, servers, and attendants had a major piece of leverage this summer: eight scheduled World Cup matches. Their victory came days after a 96 percent vote to authorize a strike.

Their next contract will expire at the end of April 2028, weeks before the Los Angeles Summer Olympics.

“Workers represented by UNITE HERE Local 11 have created an important tool to keep themselves and their communities safe,” said Cassandra Gomez, a senior staff attorney at the National Employment Law Project.

She called the win “particularly significant” because in Los Angeles, with the Supreme Court’s recent approval, ICE has been sending out “roving patrols” who operate by racial profiling instead of setting out to track down particular people.

Two fatal shootings by ICE agents over the past week have stoked terror and outrage across the country. In Houston, agents shot and killed Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a Mexican father of three, on his way to work at a construction site July 7. And in Maine, agents fatally shot Joan Sebastian Guerrero, a 26-year-old from Colombia, on July 13 in front of his wife and his three-year-old daughter. “She was still in her Bluey pajamas,” a neighbor said.

Members at the L.A. stadium also won significant wage increases: bartenders and servers will see a 30 percent increase in automatic tips, and non-tipped workers will return to work with a $9-per-hour raise.

A GAME CHANGER

Meanwhile in downtown Philadelphia, another World Cup host city, 200 workers at the Sheraton and Warwick hotels won contracts in June that will raise wages to $30 an hour by 2028.

UNITE HERE Local 274 also won pension increases, and a decrease in daily quotas for room attendants.

At the Sheraton, workers went on strike for nine days; at the Warwick, they got as far as voting to authorize a strike. Adding pressure on the hotels to settle were two more big tourist events: the country’s 250th anniversary celebration and the Major League Baseball all-star game.

The Sheraton strike drew support from other unions and elected officials. IATSE members refused to cross the picket line to set up for events inside. AFSCME District Council 33, the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers, and the Association of the Flight Attendants brought food to rallies.

Local 274 campaigned for new standard-raising contracts at eight downtown hotels this year; seven of these have now settled contracts, which are aligned to expire in 2028.

“$30 an hour will be a game-changer for me,” said Shafeek Anderson, who has worked seven years at the Sheraton. “It would mean I could actually start saving for the future.”

6 A.M. WALKOUT

In Seattle, hotel workers at the Hilton Embassy Suites have been on strike since June 18.

“Some people left their job in the middle of their shift at 6 in the morning and joined us,” said Hayden Eyerly, a front desk agent. “It was electric, and it’s been electric ever since.”

They’re demanding higher wages, improvements to their health plan, and the right to call out without discipline if immigration agents are in the building.

Allowing workers to stay home if ICE were on the premises would “just show a little bit of humanity, if Hilton was to do that,” Eyerly said. “We’re just trying to preemptively prepare for anything that could happen here in Seattle like we’ve seen in other parts of the country.”

During the strike, Seattle has hosted five World Cup games at Lumen Field stadium, which sits just across from the hotel. “We’ve had fans get on the picket line and start doing chants,” Eyerly said. “We’ve had some bring drums.”

Teamsters who pick up garbage at the hotel have refused to cross the picket line. Mayor Katie Wilson relocated an event that had been previously scheduled at the hotel.

The World Cup games at the Seattle stadium have now concluded, but members are holding the line. “Every day it’s frustrating, but it only makes us more resolved to see this through,” Jus Adsuara, a public areas attendant at the hotel, told KING 5 News.

“The people out here fighting alongside me continue to inspire me daily,” Eyerly said. “Even when I’m having a hard time chanting because my vocal chords are shredded, I’m finding the energy to continue because of them.”

CREATURES OF THE SEA ON STRIKE

A few miles away, workers also struck at the James Beard award-nominated oyster restaurant The Walrus and the Carpenter.

Their independent union, United Creatures of the Sea, formed last year after the restaurant switched from tips to a service charge—a big pay cut. “I think I stayed up all night reading up about the format for authorization cards,” said former server Ford Nickel, now the union’s secretary treasurer.

After months of negotiations, workers voted unanimously to walk out on an unfair labor practice strike. “No one had participated in a strike before, and no one really had an idea of what this is supposed to look like,” Nickel said. “I was like, ‘I don’t know if people are gonna do chants, maybe they’re gonna think it’s hokey.’ Nope! Everyone was on board.”

A spirit of solidarity buoyed the strikers. They visited the hotel picket lines; the hotel strikers visited theirs. Other restaurant workers brought food and water.

Nickel estimated that 80 percent of would-be customers chose not to patronize the restaurant after seeing the picket. “There were people that we’ve seen for the past four to six years,” he said. “They were like, ‘Oh, you did it! Ok, we’ll see you when you open again, when you have a contract.”

After eight days on strike, the United Creatures of the Sea returned to work with a reduced service fee of 6 percent, and a return to the tipping model.