Union workers at the JBS meatpacking plant in Greeley plan to spend Saturday preparing for what could become the nation’s first meatpacker strike in decades.
Some will train to be picket captains, while others make picket signs. As for the actual walkout of nearly 3,800 JBS workers in Greeley? A decision could be made by Feb. 20, the one day JBS is willing to negotiate, union officials said.
JBS production employees have been on an extended contract since late July, after the previous agreement expired. The union can end the extension with seven days’ notice, said Kim Cordova, president of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 7, which represents workers at the Weld County plant, one of the largest beef processors in the U.S.
“If JBS does not return to the bargaining table and they don’t resolve the unfair labor practices, then we will pull the extension,” Cordova said Tuesday.
The union had filed a handful of complaints with the National Labor Relations Board alleging retaliation and change to terms and conditions of employment by JBS, also known as Swift Beef Company. Last week, 99% of unionized JBS workers voted to authorize the union to strike citing unfair labor practices.
Employee safety and working conditions are top concerns for the union, which has accused the company of trying to squeeze more work out of staff while reducing hours and creating an unsafe work environment. Cordova said the plant has sped up the production line to process 420 animals per hour, up from 390.
“It’s not just safety for the worker but safety for the consumer. You want to make sure that … any part of that cow is properly inspected and processed,” she said. “They’re just shutting down operations one day a week and that’s why they’re speeding up the lines. They want you to do all the work that normally would take five days in four days.”
JBS did not answer direct questions about working conditions and safety but offered this statement: “Our priority has always been to reach a fair and consistent agreement that recognizes the important role our team members play while also supporting the long-term stability of our operations and the Greeley community,” Nikki Richardson, a JBS spokesperson, said in an email.
The company is massive. Headquartered in Greeley, JBS USA has 132 processing facilities, 109,000 employees and operates in nine countries, according to its website. In the third quarter last year, JBS Beef North America had record net sales of $7.2 billion, up 14.8% from a year earlier. In the first nine months of 2025, net sales reached$20.5 billion, up 14.5%. Its Brazilian parent, JBS S.A., is even larger with net sales of $63.1 billion in the first three quarters, up 10%.
But the company has attracted unwanted attention about its workforce in the past. During the pandemic, six workers in Greeley died from coronavirus and hundreds more were infected, which federal authorities blamed on unsafe working conditions. In 2023, a U.S. Department of Labor investigation found that a JBS cleaning-service contractor employed minors as young as 13 at several plants, including in Greeley.
In December, three workers filed a lawsuit in federal court over worker safety and unkept promises. The lawsuit alleged that in late 2023, a JBS employee made and publicized TikTok videos that “JBS knew and approved of,” promising jobs and housing to non-English-speakers.
Several immigrants from Haiti who held temporary protected status, or TPS, allowing them to work in the U.S., responded and overwhelmed available housing options. The 17 one-bedroom rooms at the nearby Rainbow Motel put up to 12 people in one room and some of the recruits “were charged additional weekly fees for the crowded, fetid hotel rooms,” according to the lawsuit.
Once on the jobsite, recruits who didn’t speak English or Spanish did not get adequate workplace safety training or company orientation and many “experienced serious injuries while completing their work.” The lawsuit alleged discrimination because of race, misrepresentation of work conditions and housing, and reduced wages after recruitment fees and housing expenses were deducted.
Lawyers for the employees said they don’t have a precise number of impacted workers but “believe it could include hundreds of workers,” said Juno Turner, litigation director with Towards Justice in Denver. The lawsuit is seeking class action status for the workers.
JBS did not answer questions about the lawsuit.
Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem wanted to end the TPS for Haitian migrants, but a federal judge last week blocked the order. The Department of Homeland Security is still attempting to end TPS for Haitians.
The Greeley plant operates three shifts over 24 hours a day, according to the lawsuit. Production employees stun and slaughter the cows, remove the hides and organs, trim the carcasses and prepare the meat for distribution to customers and restaurants.
The job requires “repetitive motions, sharp-edged hooks, knives and band saws, heavy bags and boxes, and unpredictable animals, among uncountable other hazards,” according to the lawsuit.
Meatpacking strikes are rare, but they’re part of a storied history in America first publicized in 1906 when muckraker journalist Upton Sinclair wrote “The Jungle,” about the labor and sanitary conditions of industry. In Colorado, the last meatpacker strike was in 1980 at the Monfort Packing Plant, which is now owned by JBS, according to the Greeley Tribune. The last in the U.S. was in 1985, when workers walked out at the Hormel Foods Corp. in Minnesota.
It’s also an industry that has attracted immigrant workers and employs a majority of people of color. JBS had long recruited immigrants from Somalia, Eritrea and other African countries. The union says 57 languages are spoken among workers.
“This is not a plant that has undocumented workers. We have workers here that are seeking asylum, or that are on TPS,” Cordova said. “It’s really hard, dangerous work and, frankly, I don’t know where JBS would find replacement workers.”
Supporting the newer workers from Haiti is part of the union’s duty, she added.
“They’re our members,” Cordova said. “And it wasn’t just broken promises. We believe they owe them lost wages. It was a really horrible situation.”
Other JBS workers outside of Colorado reached a new contract in May. Workers at 14 JBS facilities in states including Utah, Texas and Nebraska approved a new contract that brought back pension plans, added sick pay and raised the average wage to $23 to $24 per hour, The Associated Press reported.
But most of those communities have a lower cost of living, Cordova said. In Colorado, where the minimum wage is $15.16 and paid sick leave is a state mandate, the same gains don’t go very far. JBS is currently offering Greeley workers a 60 cent hourly increase in the first year and half that for each of the next two years, Cordova said. The expired contract offered a base wage that was above $22.
“Workers would not be able to continue to live in Colorado on a 30 cent wage increase while they (JBS) are making more money than they ever have,” she said. “They’re making a profit but they’re not sharing any of that success with their workers.”