Around two dozen members of NYU’s chapter of Students for International Labor Solidarity demanded that the university slash its contract with Nike and publicly condemn the company for alleged wage theft. In speeches outside the Kimmel Center for University Life, students cited that Nike has reportedly withheld employees’ salaries at a Thailand factory that provides the NYU Bookstore with branded merchandise.
In a rally on Monday afternoon, students chanted “Nike steals, NYU knows” and “What’s outrageous, stolen wages,” sang an original song and performed poetry. NYU SILS member David Ramirez said that despite the group’s constant attempts to communicate with Associate Vice President of Campus Services Owen Moore, students have received limited response from administrators.
“We’re just trying to get a response and hear him be like, ‘Alright, let’s talk about cutting this contract — let’s make efforts and actually help these workers get paid,’” Ramirez said in an interview with WSN. “We want some communication from administration to show that they actually are gonna listen to their students.”
Speakers claimed that Nike agreed to pay affected workers $200,000 after withholding over $900,000 in wages, following protests against the company across U.S. universities. This academic year, chapters of SILS at colleges including Syracuse University and the University of California, Berkeley have protested their schools’ ties with Nike. NYU SILS representative Sophia Pandya told WSN that the group will continue to organize demonstrations and communicate with administrators until Nike completely reimburses the Thailand factory employees.
In 2021, the NYU-affiliated Workers Rights Consortium reported that Nike withheld over 3,000 workers’ wages at Hong Seng Knitting — the factory in Bangkok that produces Nike apparel — and ignored “overwhelming evidence of worker coercion.” Although the employees were allegedly not compensated at all after the factory closed in 2020, according to Thai law, employers were required to compensate temporary workers with reduced wages.
Students have been calling on Moore and athletics director Jake Olkkola to cut NYU’s contract with Nike since October 2023 through demonstrations and frequent letter deliveries to university leadership. Administrators requested Nike to refute the wage theft accusations by May 1, 2024 and told SILS members that Nike’s response conveyed it had conducted independent investigations and had not violated any laws.
“We must stand together now more than ever — show your support to these workers and show support to your students,” a SILS representative said to the crowd. “It’s up to us, the students, the people, to come together and make things right.”
Contact Eva Mundo at news@nyunews.com.
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