When JD Vance delivered a speech about the US economy late last year at a Uline facility in Allentown, Pennsylvania, he talked up the Trump administration’s key goals: removing “illegal aliens” from the country, rewarding companies that keep jobs in the US, and paying Americans good wages.
“We’re going to reward companies that build here in America and give good wages to do it,” Vance said.
The venue was no accident. Uline, a multi-billion dollar privately-held office supply company, is owned by Liz and Richard Uihlein, two of the biggest donors to Maga Republicans in the 2024 election.
But when it comes to immigration, Uline’s employment practices over the last several years provide an alternative picture of how the US economy works in the real world.
For years, the Guardian reported in an investigation first published in December 2024, Uline relied on what it called a “shuttle program”, a scheme in which Uline brought workers from Mexico to staff warehouses in Florida, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania for weeks and even months at a time, using visas that are meant for workers who are being trained – not working regular full-time jobs.
Uline has never responded to the Guardian’s questions about the shuttle program, which sources familiar with the program say abruptly ended in 2024, after the Guardian’s story was published.
Now, for the first time, a former Uline employee named Christian Valenzuela, 42, has come forward to share his experience in the shuttle program, including stints in Allentown, where Vance spoke in December.
Uline travel itineraries, which Valenzuela shared with the Guardian, show he made at least five trips to the US beginning in early 2022, and worked in the company’s facilities in Pennsylvania, Florida and Wisconsin.
“They told us we had to go to the United States because there were not many people who were working at that time. It was around the time of the pandemic,” he said in an interview. Uline did pay the Mexican workers a bonus, gas money and paid for accommodations, but they were paid their usual Mexican wage, Valenzuela said. The Guardian has previously reported this was a fraction of what their American counterparts earned.
Sometimes, Valenzuela said, he would ask bosses why Uline did not simply give the workers work visas. The workers, he said, sometimes faced questions from US border patrol officers, and would have to show a document, signed by Uline, that said they were entering the US to be trained.
Valenzuela provided the Guardian with one example: a 13 April 2023 letter seeking a B1 training visa addressed to Customs and Border Protection and signed by a Uline official. It outlined Valenzuela’s daily “training schedule” and said he would be tested on the training he received. He never was, Valenzuela said.
“We were just going to work,” he said. “They always gave us more work, because we were stronger workers. Because the Americans perhaps work at their own pace, going little by little. Whereas we Mexicans are faster, more productive, more everything.”
Later, he said, he came to recognize this as “discrimination”. “They always gave us the heaviest work,” he said.
Uline declined to comment in response to detailed questions by the Guardian.
Another former Uline employee, who is American and worked with the Mexicans, including Valenzuela, said: “They were given the shitty work, basically. Like packing glass, things that take extra time … supposedly to help us with the work load.” He said he recalled that when the Mexican workers were trained on new machines, overtime hours were given to them, and not to American workers whose extra hours were more expensive.
“A lot of the guys mentioned to me they were paid Mexican wages,” the former employee said. Sometimes they would meet for barbecue at the long-term hotels where they stayed. Knowing their pay was different, the former employee said he would bring the meat, as a way of trying to help out.
Everything changed for Valenzuela on 6 June 2023, when he had an accident in Uline’s Wisconsin facility that he alleges has left him permanently disabled.
He was operating a forklift when another vehicle crashed into him, dealing a “super strong blow” to his left side. “It was a super hard hit. It was heard throughout the entire warehouse,” he recalled.
He began to feel the intense pain 10 minutes later, he said, when his adrenaline started to subside. Valenzuela said he was taken to a doctor, accompanied by a Uline security staff member. The doctor told him to rest, apply ice and take Tylenol. He was not to return to work until six days later, according to discharge papers seen by the Guardian. He was never given an X-ray.
“After receiving that note, the Uline representative spoke with the doctor, and the doctor changed the note so that I would return to work on light duty,” he said. Valenzuela said he worked for one more week after that, doing eight-hour shifts on a forklift.
Both discharge instructions, which appear to have been signed by the same doctor, were shared with the Guardian, and confirm Valenzuela’s account.
Each day after he got back to work, supervisors asked him if he was OK to go back to his regular, heavier work duties, and asked him to sign a document saying he was fully recovered. “All week they kept telling me, ‘You know what, you’re fine now.’” He kept responding that no, he wasn’t fine – and he wanted to see the doctor again.
Valenzuela was told to return to Mexico to be checked by a doctor there, a process that he said took weeks.
“When I finally saw the doctor, I was immediately placed on medical leave and referred to a specialist, who ordered an MRI of my lower back to determine the diagnosis,” he said.
A physical therapist told him he needed to lose weight to see if it would help with his pain, because Valenzuela said he was considered “high risk” for the surgery he needed on his back. He paid for his own weight loss surgery and said he lost enough weight to proceed with surgery for a herniated disc and nerve compression, which Valenzuela said was caused by the accident.
“Even now, I continue to experience pain, reduced strength and loss of sensation in my left leg due to the nerve damage. At this moment, I am still unable to work and must take medication for pain and for nerve rehabilitation,” he said.
Over the entire length of his ordeal, Valenzuela said he was called twice by Uline, asking him to sign resignation paperwork, which he said he did not want to do because he needed the job to cover rehabilitation and any additional surgeries to recover full strength. He also needs medication for his ongoing pain.
A letter from Uline’s Wisconsin-based insurer, dated 7 November 2023, rejected Valenzuela’s request for benefits. “Per our conversation it is to my understanding that you are receiving full benefits under Mexico’s workers compensation for your lost time and medical care. At this time no further benefits would be owed under your Wisconsin claim.”
When Valenzuela contacted them to request an employment letter, he was told his contract had been canceled. He alleges he was never notified.
Valenzuela said that an official with Uline in Mexico said Uline had a right to terminate his employment, and that they needed to be able to hire someone else who could fill his role.
Valenzuela – who had not heard the news about Vance’s recent visit to Uline’s Allentown facility where he once worked – said he hopes to find a lawyer who can help him.
“It’s like they’ve already forgotten about me,” he said. “It’s like what they always talk about is ‘We support workers so they can grow’,” he said. “Right now they aren’t helping me with absolutely anything; on the contrary, they are harming me.”
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