From the San Jose Mercury News:

The federal government said Wednesday it is suing a Panda Express restaurant in West San Jose for making its Latino workers clean toilets while Asian employees stood by and enjoyed an easier workload.

Living in a highly agricultural area as I do, I see Latino workers doing less desirable jobs every day—and working harder than I can imagine. But somehow I wonder if this case is really about the use of Latino workers, or if it’s about the use of the Asian workers. Bear with me.

I have represented a number of Asian restaurants. Once, as I was trying to go through some payroll records with him, a deputy labor commissioner told me that they—the DLSE—had been having trouble with Asian restaurants. In the course of the conversation, he made it clear that they were on a sort of campaign to look at Asian restaurants. Now, granted, the DLSE is not charged with enforcing the EEO laws. But I’ve wondered ever since if that wasn’t some kind of civil racial profiling.