The Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) was sued last week by a group of Arizona workers who claim the foreign company discriminated against United States citizens after the President Joe Biden successfully convinced the company to build multiple facilities near Phoenix with $6.6 billion in taxpayer funding and $5 billion in federal loans through the CHIPS Act of 2021.
According to the lawsuit filed last Friday by 13 Arizonans, which was made public Thursday, TMSC failed to address the effects of a “hostile work environment” that affects “employees who are not of East Asian race or Taiwanese or Chinese national origin.”
The lawsuit accuses TSMC of hiring mostly Taiwanese or East Asian employees as part of an “intentional pattern and practice of discrimination” against individuals who do not share that ethnicity, or are not from China or Taiwan, and claims such employees are regularly subjected to “verbal abuse, gaslighting, isolation, and humiliation,” often causing those employees to quit.
It also claims TSMC is intentionally violating a diversity plan it submitted to the Biden-Harris administration in order to receive the $6.6 billion to build its products in Arizona, claiming the company’s leaders “made clear that the company has a cultural preference for Taiwanese (and Chinese) employees.”
According to the lawsuit, bias has translated to more than 80 percent of TSMC’s employees in North America being East Asian, and the company makes it harder for American citizens and non-East Asians to apply for work by steering job listings toward foreign workers, or labeling job listings with “Mandarin / Chinese” as required or preferred for applicants.
The lawsuit comes after TSMC sparred with local labor unions after the company claimed Arizona’s workforce lacks the skills to build its factory, with union officials pleading for support from the Biden-Harris administration before reaching an agreement for the company to hire more American workers.
Through a jury trial, the plaintiffs request the certification of a class action against TSMC, a declaratory judgment declaring the Taiwanese company violated the U.S. Civil Rights Act, a permanent injunction from the alleged discriminatory behavior, plus an unspecified amount of money for back-pay, punitive damages, attorneys fees, and other related costs.
TSMC creates semiconductors used by Apple and other major technology companies who produce electronic devices, and President Joe Biden’s presidential campaign hailed the progress made at semiconductor factories in Arizona before suspending his presidential campaign and endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris.
It was reported last year that “almost half” of the labor used to build TSMC’s Arizona facilities is from Taiwan, while earlier reporting revealed the factories will produce incomplete products that will require final “packing” which is completed in Taiwan.
Many Taiwanese workers at TSMC reportedly accepted their position with the explicit goal of having children while in the United States, as those born on American soil are enshrined with citizenship at birth.
– – –
Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star, and also reports for The Pennsylvania Daily Star and The Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Image “TMSC Workers” by TMSC.
