Workers at Trump International Golf Club, Dubai complain of labor abuses

Migrant workers hired to work at the Trump International Golf Club in Dubai say they are frequently paid weeks or months late and forced to work in conditions that violate local labor laws, The New York Times reports.

Two dozen current and former workers interviewed by the Times said they have had to routinely stage strikes to force their employer, local construction company Al Arif, to pay them their dues. The company is carrying out work on luxury villas at the golf club, which is managed by the Trump Organization and Damac, a major Dubai real estate developer, according to the Times. All of the workers said their employer confiscated their passports, a violation of national labor law in a country notorious for reports of labor exploitation. Amanda Miller, a spokeswoman for the Trump Organization, stressed that it has nothing to do with the treatment of the workers, saying the Trump Organization does not “oversee construction or employ or supervise any of the companies or individuals who have been retained to work on the building of the project.”