Lauro Bonilla was born in a small town near Guadalajara in the Mexican state of Jalisco, one of 11 children. His father, a small farmer, encouraged Lauro to look for work in the U.S. because it was becoming very hard to support a large family.
After my military service in Mexico, I was 19 when I came into the United States through Tijuana, and I went to Los Angeles. I looked for work on a farm near Los Angeles, because that was the work I knew. I tried to find work there but they didn’t hire me. I tried working at a car wash in Los Angeles, but they gave me a try out for a week and never hired me.” [His time in L.A. was difficult; he had only the clothes he was wearing and stayed in a house with 20 other undocumented immigrants.]
I called one of my cousins in San Francisco who picked me up, and I was there for a week, but couldn’t find a job there either, so I called one of my cousins here in Milwaukee, and he helped me to come to Milwaukee. I was only about a month in California. I came to Milwaukee in February 1979.
I went to my cousin’s house and he said he’d help me try to find a job. He found me a job almost the next day, at a tannery. They used to have a lot of tanneries in Milwaukee, now there’s only a few left. It’s hard work, and got blisters on my hands from the chemicals the first few days, and because I was so skinny a guy there told me I’m not going to make it. Well I’m a working man, so I made it, and later on I was working fine. I worked there for like seven years, until the tannery pulled out and moved to Sheboygan. I had to find another job, so I was a salesman for one year, selling vacuum cleaners house-to-house. It went pretty well and I was making good money, but my wife didn’t like me doing that job. I met my wife on a part-time job he had, cleaning offices, while working at the tannery. I had two jobs. I was 22 years old when we got married.
Then I found a job where my cousin worked, at Milwaukee Die Cast. I was there another seven or eight years, until it shut down. There was a union there, the Machinists. I always attended the meetings, but I was just a dues-paying member.
After that closed I went to my present job, Tramont Manufacturing. There was no union but I didn’t think we needed a union. They treated us good. I had a good time, I had a good relationship with the owners and managers and they had a lot of parties for the workers.
But then the owners got divorced and it got to be a tight situation, about 11 years ago. They cut wages and the management got worse. Some people got cut by $4 an hour, and they were the ones who started organizing the union. I didn’t get involved because they only cut me 50 cents. They were visiting houses and they tried to get me involved, but I said I don’t need a union. Ramiro Castillo [UE field organizer, now deceased] came to see me and he put his foot in the door, because I didn’t want to let me in. He talked to me a few times, trying to convince me.
But when I saw the company getting the government to come after people over “no-match letters” [alleged immigration violations], that changed my mind and I decided I better so something about it. So then I let Ramiro in and listened to him. He was a good organizer.
After that I decided to help the union, for my brothers, for the people. We signed cards and I talked to other people. I said I think it’s a good idea to join the union, it might save your job. The workforce was about half Latino at that time. We had the election and we won in 2004, and they elected me to be chief steward, right away. Three years later I became the president.
I like UE because they fight back all the time. We do stuff that other unions’ don’t do. When we negotiate a contract, the people in the shop make the decisions. It’s not like that in some other unions. Also our union is more equal, it’s against racism, and treats people with more respect.
I became a legal resident in the amnesty under Reagan. You were supposed to go to school and learn English and then take a test. But I didn’t go to the school, I just went and took the test and I passed, and I had to pay a fee of $800. I think it would be good for the economy to allow people today who don’t have documents to become legal through an amnesty. It would be a lot of income to the government, and it would mean people would have drivers licenses and insurance. When people become legal they spend more money in this country, instead of sending it to Mexico.