Once Undocumented Himself, Business Owner Now Criticized for Checking His Employees' Papers

"His rags-to-riches immigrant journey and good business sense crowned Juvenal Chavez the king of Latino supermarkets in the Bay Area, but now the CEO is fighting a harsh attack on the reputation of his 21-store Mi Pueblo Foods grocery chain.  Mi Pueblo stunned some of its more than 3,000 employees last month when it told them it had joined E-Verify, a Department of Homeland Security program that screens the immigration status of new hires.  Now, with union activists accusing Chavez of betraying his own undocumented immigrant roots and threatening a consumer boycott if he doesn't pull out of E-Verify by October, the entrepreneur is fighting back in a war of words against the union and political opposition." - San Jose Mercury News, Sept. 6, 2012.