Workers at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, are voting on whether to authorize a strike one week before World Cup soccer games are slated to begin in the Los Angeles area.
Unite Here Local 11’s strike authorization vote comes as ongoing negotiations for a new contract with stadium operator Legends Global have stalled, with workers saying they deserve a greater share of the windfall from a packed schedule of coming mega-events that include the World Cup, the Super Bowl and the Olympics.
“We know they’re going to make a lot of money during these events,” Yolanda Fierro, a suite runner and union member who voted to authorize the strike, told the Guardian. “So what we want is a thank-you – gratitude from the company, giving us a good, equitable contract for increasing our wages, so we can survive out here in California because it’s very expensive here in this state.”
The strike authorization vote’s results will be announced later Friday.
SoFi Stadium, normally home to Los Angeles’s two NFL teams, is hosting eight matches during the 2026 World Cup, starting with 12 June’s match between the US and Paraguay. The venue has temporarily been renamed “Los Angeles Stadium” for the duration of the games, due to Fifa’s strict branding rules.
Legends Global, the subcontractor that runs food and beverage service for the venue, did not respond to a request for comment.
Workers also want greater guarantees for their safety. Unite Here Local 11 has demanded that Fifa refuse to allow ICE officers into the stadium during the World Cup.
The ICE demand is aimed to guarantee the safety of both foreign-born union members and spectators, Fiero said.
“They pay their taxes – they just want to be treated fairly and respectfully,” Fiero said of her colleagues. “We also do not want our guests from around the world to feel in fear of coming to our stadium and feel like ICE is going to take them because they’re not from our country.”
Last month, the union and the American Civil Liberties Union of southern California asked the attorney general, Rob Bonta, to investigate Fifa’s data-collection practices, saying that Fifa was collecting workers’ sensitive personal details, requiring them to waive their California data-protection rights, and then handing that information over to the Department of Homeland Security.
“These workers are being put in an impossible bind, where they are being forced to choose between their livelihoods and handing over their most personal sensitive information,” the letter reads. “Workers in California should not be forced to make this choice.”
Fifa’s media department sent an auto-reply email to a Guardian request for comment saying that the organization would respond within 14 days.
ICE raids became notorious across the country as the Trump administration orchestrated extensive operations in blue cities as a show of force against “sanctuary” policies aimed at shielding undocumented workers from indiscriminate immigration arrests and detentions.
Some of the most intense conflicts between ICE and protesters took place in Los Angeles, where officers routinely raided worksites like car washes and partially blinded at least two protesters with “less-lethal” munitions. The blindings and other confrontations with the public took place during crowd-control operations that ICE historically has not taken part in.
