Posts tagged with 'feet in 2 worlds'
Weekly Diaspora: 100 Years After Triangle Fire, Immigrant Workers Still Fighting for Labor Rights
Filed under: 
by Catherine A. Traywick, Media Consortium blogger
Last week marked the centennial of the infamous Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire, in which 146 mostly immigrant workers died. The tragedy prompted widespread labor reforms in the United States, but its commemoration underscores the plight of immigrant workers similarly exploited today.
As Richard Greenwald notes at Working in These Times, the disaster marked “the moment that a strong collective working class demanded its citizenship rights,” while today, “we are living in a time where organized labor is weak, fractured and leaderless.” He concludes that a rebirth of labor must come, as it did in 1911, from today’s new immigrant communities, which continue to bear the brunt of exploitative labor practices.
Immigrant workers rally for labor rights
Immigrant workers and union organizers articulated the same sentiment when they commemorated the fire last week. According to Catalina Jaramillo at Feet in Two Worlds, labor groups rallied Friday to call for safer working conditions and unionization—especially for the thousands of immigrants who face abuse and exploitation because of their immigration status. One union member articulated the similarities between today’s migrant workers and those who perished in the Triangle Fire:
“I see that a hundred years since this terrible accident that killed so many people, things have really not changed at all,” said Walfre Merida, a member of Local 79, from the stage.
Merida, 25, said before joining the union he worked at a construction company where he was not paid overtime, had no benefits and was paid in cash.
“Safety conditions, none. Grab your tool and go to work, no more. And do not stop,” he told El Diario/La Prensa. ”When we worked in high places, on roofs, we never used harnesses, one became accustomed to the dangers and thanked God we weren’t afraid of heights. One would risk his life out of necessity.”
Kari Lydersen at Working In These Times adds that, while workplaces in general have gotten safer, immigrant workers tend to be employed in the most dangerous professions and are disproportionately affected by workplace health and safety problems. In particular, foreign-born Latinos tend to suffer injury and illness at a much higher rate than U.S.-born Latinos. Lydersen writes:
Work-related injury and illness can be especially devastating for undocumented workers since they are often fired because of their injury and they often don’t collect workers compensation or other benefits due them. […] A 2009 Government Accountability Office report says non-fatal workplace injuries could be under-reported by 80 percent.
Crackdown on immigrant workers bad for the economy
Other labor rights advocates are drawing attention to the federal government’s ongoing crackdown on immigrant workers. Worksite audits which require employers to check the immigration status of their workers have resulted in thousands of layoffs in recent months. This sweeping trend hurts families as well as local economies, according to a new report from the Center for American Progress and the Immigration Policy Center.
The report specifically looks at the economic impact of immigrant workers in Arizona, but its findings present much wider implications. Marcos Restrepo at The Colorado Independent sums up the key points:
- The analysis estimates that immigrants on the whole paid $6 billion in taxes in 2008, while undocumented immigrants paid approximately $2.8 billion.
- Increase tax revenues by $1.68 billion.
The report adds that the effects of deportation in Arizona would:
- Decrease total employment by 17.2 percent.
- Eliminate 581,000 jobs for immigrant and native-born workers alike.
- Shrink the state economy by $48.8 billion.
- Reduce state tax revenues by 10.1 percent.
Meanwhile, the effects of legalization in Arizona would:
- Add 261,000 jobs for immigrant and native-born workers alike.
- Increase labor income by $5.6 billion.
Restrepo adds that, in part because of such mounting evidence, immigrants rights advocates are exhorting authorities to recognize immigrants as workers, first and foremost.
Immigrant farm owners contend with exploitation
Of course, even when immigrants are owners, rather than employees, they still disproportionately contend with exploitative industry practices. At The American Prospect, Monica Potts reports on the unique experiences of Hmong immigrants operating chicken farms in the Ozarks. Specifically, Potts examines how behemoth agri-businesses like Tyson exploit the inexperience or limited English abilities of immigrants to sell chicken farms and secure contracts that often put the farmers deep into debt:
Many Hmong were signing contracts they couldn’t read and getting into deals they didn’t fully understand. At least 12 Hmong declared bankruptcy in 2006. […] The concerns are similar for other immigrant farmers, especially Hispanics, who moved into the area to work at chicken-processing plants but were also recruited to buy operations. Hispanic farmers sometimes pooled their money and bought farms without a contract, only to realize later they wouldn’t be able to sell their chickens on the open market. … Many just walked away rather than trying to save their farms.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about immigration by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Diaspora for a complete list of articles on immigration issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, and health care issues, check out The Audit, The Mulch, and The Pulse. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.
Weekly Diaspora: Sweeping AZ Immigration Bills Target Undocumented Children
By Catherine A. Traywick, Media Consortium blogger
The Arizona state Senate moved forward with two controversial measures this week that threaten to marginalize undocumented youth to an unprecedented degree.
An anti-birthright citizenship bill, which initially failed to muster the votes necessary to proceed, was finally approved Tuesday after Senate President Russell Pearce (R) shrewdly reassigned it to a “friendlier” committee. SB 1309 is now headed to the Rules Committee, where it is, again, expected to pass. The bill seeks to deny automatic citizenship to the U.S.-born children of undocumented persons—an effort that, if successful, would effectively create a self-perpetuating underclass of stateless children.
Proponents argue that the bill would discourage unauthorized immigration by taking away a chief incentive, but the measure has more ominous implications. It would render generations of U.S.-born undocumented children vulnerable to a variety of discriminations—their rights to education, employment and a breadth of social services repeatedly contested, if not altogether denied.
Arizona Senate to vote on sweeping omnibus immigration bill
And, as if the prospect of that future isn’t bleak enough, the Arizona state Senate is considering another bill that would, essentially, force similar outcomes on undocumented youth living in Arizona today. Valeria Fernández at New American Media reports that the measure would, among other provisions, “ban undocumented students from accessing higher education; require proof of legal status to attend K-12 schools; and require hospitals to inquire about the immigration status of their patients.”
Like SB 1309, the success of Pearce’s omnibus bill is the product of some artful maneuvering on the part of the senate president. After watching several of his party’s anti-immigration measures flounder in recent weeks, Pearce devised the omnibus bill—hobbling it together over the weekend from the tattered remains of several failed immigration measures. He introduced it Monday, tardily and to the surprise of his fellow senators, according to Colorlines.com’s Julianne Hing. The Senate Appropriations Committee passed the bill on Wednesday—though not without considerable debate and dissent—and it is already headed to the floor for a vote.
Notwithstanding the measure’s swift progress, many opponents believe Pearce’s legislative chicanery is a sign of weakness. Hing writes:
Immigrant rights activists say the maneuver is proof of Pearce’s desperation. “It is clear he does not have the votes to do what he wanted the way he wanted,” said Alfredo Gutierrez, a former state senator who heads the immigrant rights group Somos America. “Pearce has clearly staked his reputation on the 14th amendment bills, but now he’s found himself on the defensive. […] It’s proof that we’re being effective,” Gutierrez said.
Both SB 1309, the citizenship bill, and SB 1622, the omnibus measure, tread dangerously close to unconstitutionality. While the former attempts to reinterpret the 14th Amendment’s Citizenship Clause—which has, for 130 years, guaranteed the right to citizenship at birth—the latter threatens to violate its Equal Protection Clause—which, as upheld by the Supreme Court in Plyler v. Doe, grants all children the right to a public education. As such, the bills would likely face myriad legal challenges if passed, much the same as SB 1070.
While the bills are shocking in their breadth and pernicious in their potential for marginalizing scores of unauthorized immigrants, even under current law undocumented youth must contend with a number of barriers to education, employment and stability.
Undocumented college graduates mired in immigration limbo
As Liane Membis notes at Campus Progress, countless undocumented students graduate from college straddled with debt, burdened by the constant threat of deportation, and unable to obtain gainful—or even legal employment—due to their immigration status. Membis relates the story of Teresa Serrano, an accomplished, civically minded, 2010 Yale University graduate whose undocumented status now inhibits her from pursuing her chosen career:
“What I felt on graduation day was different—something more severe,” she said. “I had spent the past four years at this elite institution, compartmentalizing a painful truth, and I knew that when I graduated I would be confronted with my harsh reality yet again.” […] She left New Haven and returned to her home in Texas. Now her daily routine consists of nine-to-five job shifts at fast food restaurants and laundromats, the advantages of her Yale degree negated by her undocumented status.
The DREAM Act, a federal bill that would have created a path to legalization for certain undocumented college students, could have changed Serrano’s life. But after its defeat last November, and given the high improbability that any sort of comprehensive immigration reform will progress this year, her career ambitions are necessarily eclipsed by the simple goal of remaining in the United States.
Undocumented LGBT youth bear double burden
Still other undocumented youth fare worse—among them, a growing population of homeless LGBT immigrants. At Feet in 2 Worlds, Von Diaz reports that roughly half of New York City’s homeless youth identifies as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender while 15 percent were born outside of the United States. Moreover, between 10 and 20 percent of residents at two homeless shelters in 2010 were LGBT immigrants. Many of them were turned out onto the streets by intolerant families and must now routinely contend with threats and vulnerabilities owing to their youth, sexual identities, and undocumented status.
Juan Valdez, a 21-year-old gay immigrant from the Dominican Republic, tells his story below:
Note that the future imagined by Pearce and his anti-immigrant cohorts is one in which the daily injustices endured by Teresa Serrano and Juan Valdez are not only the norm, but evidence of a job well done.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about immigration by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Diaspora for a complete list of articles on immigration issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, and health care issues, check out The Audit, The Mulch, and The Pulse. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.
