Confronting Exploitation, Retaliation and Deportation to Build Power for Immigrant Workers
Session Type(s): Panel
Starts: Saturday, Jul. 18 11:30 AM (Eastern)
Ends: Saturday, Jul. 18 12:45 PM (Eastern)
The fear of deportation has made it easy for bad employers to exploit and retaliate against workers who try to assert their rights. This has played into the power divide between workers and bosses, leaving unscrupulous employers with the most to gain. We’ll discuss creative strategies to organize immigrant workers, stop immigration-based retaliation and fight back against unjust deportations in order to shift power from the boss to the workers.
Moderator
Natalie Patrick-Knox
Since a trip to El Salvador with a women’s right solidarity group in 2000, Natalie has been propelled by social justice and immigrant rights causes. Natalie is originally from Kansas, where she was active in student, interfaith, and community organizations. She earned a master’s degree in social policy from the London School of Economics, where she worked on migration, women’s rights, and grassroots participation. Natalie then moved to Portland, OR, where she was an organizer for Causa, Oregon’s Immigrant Rights Organization. She now lives in Washington D.C. and is part of the national staff of Jobs With Justice, where she works on the POWER Campaign to stop the exploitation of and retaliation against immigrant workers.
Panelists
Julio Fernandez
1998 and settled in Nashville, TN. He is a natural organizer, with great passion for his work and strong sense of social justice. In 1999 he witnessed a white boss brutally beat a co-worker. This frightening experience was the beginning of a new life dedicated to the defense of labor and civil rights, particularly those of immigrants. So Fernández began splitting his time between work that paid the bills and working as a leader and volunteer in his community, In 2006 he began volunteering with the Tennessee Immigrants Refugees Rights Coalition (TIRRC) and earn the TAP Long Haul Award, Since 2008 Fernández has continued to be on the front lines with immigrant workers. He organized communities is rural areas around Knoxville And workers with Jobs With Justice is now in Minneapolis working with the (CTUL) Centro de Trabajadores Unidos en Lucha and SEIU to organize janitors