“Everybody that's here, is legal” white employers' racial ideologies in the workplace and justifications for hiring undocumented Latino laborers

Abstract

White employers routinely hire undocumented Latino immigrant workers based on their perceived racializations about their subservience. Researchers have explored how employers racialize Latinos, yet there is less understanding of how white employers justify breaking immigration labor policies. This study analyzes the justifications of both racialized exploitation and organizational decoupling that supports violations of immigration laws. Using in-depth interviews with 20 white employers, this study explores employer racializations of Latinos, views of whiteness in the workplace, and justifications to hire undocumented immigrants. White employers praise Latinos for their perceived subservience, favor whites for management, and neutralize their own unlawful actions of hiring undocumented laborers. White employers frame themselves as rational, innocent, and virtuous while reinforcing racial stratification and breaking immigration laws. This study provides insights on employer labor practices with implications for labor mobility, migration reform, and racial inequality in the workplace.