{"id":550029,"date":"2026-03-28T07:54:21","date_gmt":"2026-03-28T07:54:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/550029\/"},"modified":"2026-03-28T07:54:21","modified_gmt":"2026-03-28T07:54:21","slug":"strike-at-one-of-the-largest-us-meatpacking-plants-goes-into-a-3rd-week","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/550029\/","title":{"rendered":"Strike at one of the largest US meatpacking plants goes into a 3rd week"},"content":{"rendered":"

DENVER (AP) \u2014 Thousands of striking workers<\/a> at one of the nation\u2019s largest meatpacking plants will extend their walkout to a third week as they push for higher wages and better health care.<\/p>\n

Industry experts said it\u2019s too early to know if the strike that began March 16 at the Swift Beef Co. plant in Greeley, Colorado, will impact retail beef prices that already had soared to record levels<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe workers know the value of their labor,\u201d union President Kim Cordova said Friday. \u201cThis could be a long, drawn out fight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Owner JBS USA said Friday that it\u2019s operating the plant at limited capacity and has shifted beef production elsewhere to meet customers needs.<\/p>\n

With negotiations stalled, the company remains in a strong position relative to the striking workers, said Jennifer Martin at Colorado State University\u2019s animal sciences department.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s because the industry is suddenly less burdened by excess slaughter capacity that had been keeping profit margins low. Now amid the Greeley strike and other slaughter plant capacity reductions \u2014 including the closure of a major Tyson Foods\u2019 plant<\/a> in Nebraska \u2014 companies are seeing profits increase, Martin said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not necessarily in favor of the employees,\u201d she added. \u201cThe lack of harvest capacity at one facility right now might actually be a benefit to the larger industry in the sense of improving (profit) margins.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Meatpacking<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s the first strike at a U.S. slaughterhouse since workers walked out at a Hormel plant in Minnesota in 1985. That strike lasted more than a year<\/a> and included violent confrontations between police and protesters.<\/p>\n

The Greeley strike began with support from 99% of the plant\u2019s 3,800 workers who belong to the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 7 union. Thousands have showed up at the picket line over the past two weeks.<\/p>\n

Union officials say the company\u2019s offer of 2% wage hikes is less than inflation.<\/p>\n

JBS said its contract offer is consistent with a deal reached with UFCW union workers at other plants. But Cordova said Colorado has a higher cost of living than those other locations and health care costs ate up much of the wage increase.<\/p>\n

JBS is the world\u2019s largest meatpacking company with a market capitalization of $17 billion. It\u2019s the top employer in Greeley, a city 50 miles (80 kilometers) northeast of Denver with a population of about 114,000 people.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are maintaining supply, supporting the long-term stability of the beef chain, and minimizing disruption for producers, customers, and consumers,\u201d JBS spokesperson Nikki Richardson said in an email. \u201cOur priority is to keep product moving while we work toward a resolution in Greeley.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2020, the Greeley plant was the scene of Colorado\u2019s deadliest workplace coronavirus outbreak<\/a>, with 291 infections and six deaths among plant workers. During the outbreak, President Donald Trump issued an executive order<\/a> to keep meatpacking plants across the U.S. open over concerns about the pandemic\u2019s impact on the nation\u2019s food supply.<\/p>\n

Federal regulators later fined JBS $15,615 for failing to protect its employees<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In the wake of the pandemic, beef companies invested billions of dollars to increase slaughter capacity and ensure enough meat would be available for consumers, Martin said. <\/p>\n

But recent years have seen U.S. cattle numbers drop to a 75-year low, driven in part by drought and low prices offered to ranchers. That\u2019s meant the additional slaughter capacity is not as needed, Martin said. <\/p>\n

JBS was approved for trading<\/a> on the New York Stock Exchange last May, despite environmental opposition<\/a> and a federal probe that led to its guilty plea for bribing Brazilian officials<\/a> for the financing it used for its U.S. expansion.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

Brown reported from Billings, Montana.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DENVER (AP) \u2014 Thousands of striking workers at one of the nation\u2019s largest meatpacking plants will extend their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":550030,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[17235,28,3829,3832,33357,1840,12,793,61327,2601,851,147656,1931,237235,6490,6429,30846,117481,795,244881],"class_list":["post-550029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-activism","tag-business","tag-co-state-wire","tag-colorado","tag-compensation-and-benefits","tag-denver","tag-donald-trump","tag-general-news","tag-greeley","tag-health-care-industry","tag-inc","tag-jbs-nv","tag-jobs-and-careers","tag-kim-cordova","tag-manufacturing-sector","tag-minnesota","tag-strikes","tag-tyson-foods","tag-u-s-news","tag-united-food-and-commercial-workers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/550029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=550029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/550029\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/550030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=550029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=550029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=550029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}