Immigration raid targets Smithfield Foods

Federal immigration enforcement officials are conducting an ongoing raid in the counties surrounding the Smithfield Foods pork slaughterhouse in Bladen County.

Officials at the plant said that Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials took some workers out of the plant at 4 a.m., and that arrests have continued in neighborhoods in four counties.

Twenty to 30 people have been arrested so far in the ongoing raid, ICE spokesman Richard Rocha said this afternoon. Rocha said those being arrested are suspected of identity theft.

This is the second time this year that employees of the Smithfield plant, which is the world's largest pork slaughterhouse, have been the target of immigration raids.

In January, 21 employees were arrested on the job. After those arrests, the company fired more than 500 workers whose Social Security numbers didn't match up with federal records.

Plant spokesman Dennis Pittman said the plant has done everything it can to root out illegal immigrants. But he said the government gives them no tools to catch people who buy the Social Security numbers of U.S. citizens, a practice that has become relatively common.

"If someone has truly bought a complete identity, there's no way we can catch it," Pittman said.

Smithfield is one of several meatpacking plants around the country that has come under federal scrutiny since an immigration crackdown began nearly a year ago.