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Over 200 UE members and supporters rallied outside Wells Fargo’s Chicago offices, demanding that the giant bank restore financing to Quad City Die Casting, and save 100 jobs in Moline, IL. Even though it received $25 billion in federal bailout money for the purpose of aiding economic recovery, Wells Fargo cut off Quad City’s credit, and as a result, the plant is scheduled to close on July 12.
A caravan of Local 1174 members traveled across the state from the Quad Cities to the Chicago protest, where they were joined by members of other unions, community allies, and Chicago UE members – including members of UE Local 1110 who occupied Republic Windows and Doors for six days in December after other banks cut off its credit and forced it to close. Later Local 1174 members met with Local 1110 members to share strategy ideas.
The website Progress Illinois reports that workers “expressed outrage at Wells Fargo’s decision” to cut off credit to QCDC, a successful family-owned manufacturer that has operated for the past 60 years. “People are going to lose their homes, their cars,” said Debbie Johann, a 31-year veteran of the plant. “What do they want us to do — live in a cardboard box?”
Union garment workers employed by men’s suit maker Hartmarx have also been fighting Wells Fargo to prevent it from forcing their company to liquidate, an outcome that would destroy the jobs of some 4,000 employees.
Besides putting manufacturing jobs in jeopardy, Wells Fargo is under fire for targeting African American borrowers for high-rate subprime mortgages. The city of Baltimore has sued the bank, alleging that Wells Fargo deliberately steered black home buyers into subprime loans even when the customers’ incomes and credit qualified them for safer prime loans. These predatory practices drove many homeowners to foreclosure, the suit alleges, and a former bank employee testified that she and fellow Wells Fargo loan officers “rode the stagecoach from hell” in carrying out the bank's destructive and discriminatory policies. In a sworn affidavit another former loan officer says that Wells Fargo officials referred to African American borrowers as "mud people" and called their mortgages "ghetto loans."
Baltimore officials say more than half the homes foreclosed by Wells Fargo now stand vacant, and the bank's practices have cost the city tens of millions of dollars in taxes and city services.