From Farm to Factory: The Rural-Urban Coalition for Immigrants' Rights

Part 2 of a series on solutions to freeing victims of labor trafficking around the globe. With the help of organizations like Damayan Migrant Workers Association in New York, former victims who have been freed from labor trafficking become advocates for others, demanding changes and becoming part of the solution to a vicious cycle of worker victimization.

Equip is a business in Lebanon that is trying to prevent further abuse of domestic workers, by helping them communicate better with their employers. “Their business model relies on employers paying for the company’s services, which range from $10 to $550, and include English lessons, first-aid training, legal translation, and conflict mediation.”

Cities with sanctuary policies, which grew out of the sanctuary movement of the 1980s, limit local law enforcement’s cooperation with immigration agents. Original sanctuary efforts led by churches and religious clergy helped protect more than 1,500 Central American refugees, and echoes of this movement can be seen in efforts to resist ICE operations today.

A California law enacted in 2018 limits local law enforcement’s cooperation with federal immigration officials, preventing local police from arresting someone solely for having a deportation order or keeping them in custody longer than necessary to allow time for immigration officers to arrive. The state’s share of national ICE arrests has fallen, as has the number of people transferred from state prison to ICE custody, but challenges to California’s law and “sanctuary” policies like it are mounting.

After enduring unfair working conditions, an organizing committee at a Starbucks in Tennessee, later dubbed the Memphis Seven, became the first of the state to attempt, and succeed, to unionize with help from Starbucks Workers United. Their work inspired a nationwide movement, and now over 250 Starbucks are unionized.

After a series of protests, petitions, and various attempts to rectify the crushing debt faced by NYC medallion owners, a hunger strike finally led to victory for The New York Taxi Workers Alliance. The debt was capped at a fraction of its original amount, allowing taxi drivers to realistically pay off the loans.

Congress created the U visa program in 2000 to encourage undocumented immigrants to report crimes to the police and cooperate with investigations and prosecutions. The visa legalizes an immigrant's status, if certified by a law enforcement agency and approved by the federal government. Some police departments, like Whitehall, Ohio's, routinely reject requests for certification because they want to avoid entanglements in immigration matters, or simply because they are anti-immigrant. No national rules require agencies to comply with the system, though some states do.

"The Nest" in Tijuana is a space for migrant children to relax and be themselves during a very stressful time. "The Nest" was established by the Pedagogical Institute of Los Angeles and sits across the street from a shelter where many of their students live. Parents and other migrants also benefit from the space which they describe as stress-relieving.

Sesame Workshop and the International Rescue Committee created a special show for displaced Syrian children conducted entirely in Arabic. The show teaches children lessons like counting and the alphabet, but it also teaches them emotional coping skills, which is very important for refugee children. The show is accompanied by trained early childhood development facilitators who visit homes and interact with the children playing games or reading books.

School on Wheels is a program serving children in a refugee camp along the U.S.-Mexico border by transforming an old school bus into a space for learning. The school can fit up to 80 children, all of whom are waiting for asylum in the U.S. It is run by the California-based nonprofit, Yes We Can, and it currently has 3 teachers and over 30 students. The school aims to teach the children values like love, happiness, and being a good person while they are at a particularly tumultuous time in their lives.