Smithfield agrees to pay $2 million to resolve child labor allegations at Minnesota meat plant

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Smithfield Foods, one of the nation’s largest meat processors, has agreed to pay $2 million to resolve allegations of child labor violations at a plant in Minnesota, officials announced Thursday.

An investigation by the Minnesota Department of Labor and Industry found that the Smithfield Packaged Meats subsidiary employed at least 11 children at its plant in St. James ages 14 to 17 from April 2021 through April 2023, the agency said. Three of them began working for the company when they were 14, it said. Smithfield let nine of them work after allowable hours and had all 11 perform potentially dangerous work, the agency alleged.

As part of the settlement, Smithfield also agreed to steps to ensure future compliance with child labor laws. U.S. law prohibits companies from employing people younger than 18 to work in meat processing plants because of hazards.

State Labor Commissioner Nicole Blissenbach said the agreement "sends a strong message to employers, including in the meat processing industry, that child labor violations will not be tolerated in Minnesota.”

The Smithfield, Virginia-based company said in a statement that it denies knowingly hiring anyone under age 18 to work at the St. James plant, and that it did not admit liability under the settlement. The company said all 11 passed the federal E-Verify employment eligibility system by using false identification. Smithfield also said it takes a long list of proactive steps to enforce its policy prohibiting the employment of minors.

“Smithfield is committed to maintaining a safe workplace and complying with all applicable employment laws and regulations,” the company said. “We wholeheartedly agree that individuals under the age of 18 have no place working in meatpacking or processing facilities.”

The state agency said the $2 million administrative penalty is the largest it has recovered in a child labor enforcement action. It also ranks among the larger recent child labor settlements nationwide. It follows a $300,000 agreement that Minnesota reached last year with another meat processer, Tony Downs Food Co., after the agency's investigation found it employed children as young as 13 at its plant in Madelia.

Also last year, the U.S. Department of Labor levied over $1.5 million in civil penalties against one of the country’s largest cleaning services for food processing companies, Packers Sanitation Services Inc., after finding it employed more than 100 children in dangerous jobs at 13 meatpacking plants across the country.

After that investigation, the Biden administration urged U.S. meat processors to make sure they aren't illegally hiring children for dangerous jobs. The call, in a letter by Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack to the 18 largest meat and poultry producers, was part of a broader crackdown on child labor. The Labor Department then reported a 69% increase since 2018 in the number of children being employed illegally in the U.S.

In other recent settlements, a Mississippi processing plant, Mar-Jac Poultry, agreed in August to a $165,000 settlement with the U.S. Department of Labor following the death of a 16-year-old boy. In May 2023, a Tennessee-based sanitation company, Fayette Janitorial Service LLC, agreed to pay nearly $650,000 in civil penalties after a federal investigation found it illegally hired at least two dozen children to clean dangerous meat processing facilities in Iowa and Virginia.

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Funk reported from Omaha, Nebraska.