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The 5 stores that Wal-Mart mysteriously closed are finally reopening
(AP)
Wal-Mart suddenly closed five stores in April without warning, laying off more than 2,200 employees in the process.
Six months later, the retailer is now reopening the stores and inviting previous employees to reapply for their jobs, Reuters reports.
Wal-Mart said it closed the stores in California, Texas, Oklahoma, and Florida because of persistent plumbing issues.
But Wal-Mart employees — who said they were blindsided by the closures — have a different theory about why the stores may have been closed.
They say Wal-Mart shuttered the stores in retaliation against workers protesting for better pay and working conditions, which is something Wal-Mart has been found guilty of doing in Canada.
The UFCW — a labor group representing Wal-Mart's laid-off workers — filed a claim with the National Labor Relations Board demanding that the company rehire the employees.
Wal-Mart employees weren't alone in their skepticism.
The closures also fueled a bizarre conspiracy theory that the US military was planning to enact martial law this summer under the guise of a Special Operations exercise called Jade Helm 15.
According to the theory — which has no apparent basis in reality — the military was planning to use the shuttered Wal-Mart stores as "processing" facilities for Americans once martial law was hatched.
Wal-Mart has denied that the closures had anything to do with labor activity or Jade Helm.
"The reason for the closures is to address the plumbing issues that we have at these stores," Wal-Mart spokesman Lorenzo Lopez told Business Insider in April.
All laid off workers received paid leave for two months. After that, full-time workers could become eligible for severance.
Some workers were also hired at nearby Wal-Marts during the closures.
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