Detalles del documento

2017-10-11

Centro de los Derechos del Migrante, Inc.

In the Implementation of California Anti-Trafficking Law, Government to Leave Most Migrant Workers Unprotected

(Oakland, California) - Today, migrant worker leaders, advocates, and experts will appear at a hearing before the Division of Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE) to demand that the California Labor Commissioner protect internationally recruited workers from recruitment abuses and human trafficking.

The Coalition to Abolish Slavery & Trafficking (CAST), the bill's original sponsor, and Centro de los Derechos del Migrante, Inc. (CDM) are extremely concerned that out of the 130,000 temporary workers it believed this bill was intended to protect, DLSE's interpretation in the draft regulations in fact would cover only 2.3 percent, or less than 3000 workers.

SB 477 is a groundbreaking law for curbing the abuse and exploitation of migrant workers by requiring international labor recruiters to register before bringing workers to California, a top destination of internationally recruited workers with 17 percent of all temporary workers in the United States. Passed in 2014, the law also bans recruiters from charging workers recruitment fees, requires that workers be given a contract at the time of recruitment, and prohibits discrimination and retaliation in recruitment in the state of California.

CAST's Executive Director, Kay Buck said "With the strong support of then Senator Steinberg's leadership, California passed a first of its kind piece of legislation to protect a broad range of workers coming to the United States from human trafficking and other labor exploitation. CAST is absolutely dismayed on behalf of the survivors it serves daily to learn the essential protections will be applied to so few workers."

"The lack of transparency in international labor recruitment allows recruiters to charge workers exorbitant fees, forcing migrant workers to remain under abusive conditions due to their recruitment debts," said Elizabeth Mauldin, Policy Director at Centro de los Derechos del Migrante, Inc. (CDM), a transnational migrant workers' rights organization. "Properly implemented, this groundbreaking law will empower workers with information, and free them from having to pay to work."

While the law was intended to protect all internationally recruited workers, DLSE proposed regulations implementing the law that would limit its reach to cover a single work visa category: the H-2B program for temporary nonagricultural workers. This restriction would leave over 97 percent of guestworkers in California-including those who pick fruits and vegetables, care for children, care for us at the hospital, and work in Silicon Valley-vulnerable to abuses at the hands of unscrupulous recruiters and employers.

"As migrant workers, we often start owing money even before arriving in the United States, because we have to pay back recruitment fees. Fraud and abuse are not exclusive to the H-2B program. This law should cover workers across all visa categories to prevent us from working under exploitative conditions because we're indebted," said Jorge Palafox, a former H-2B worker and member of CDM's Migrant Defense Committee, who will be testifying today.

Internationally recruited workers face common patterns of abuse related to their recruitment, including fraud, discrimination, economic coercion, retaliation, blacklisting, and, in some cases forced labor, debt bondage and human trafficking, regardless of visa category, employment sector, race, gender, or national origin.

Additional statements of support:
"The legislative intent of SB 477 was to cover all temporary foreign workers coming to California through the foreign labor recruitment process on a wide range of visa categories including H-2A workers. The bill was never intended to be limited to coverage of just H-2B workers. I am highly concerned that the draft regulations proposed by the DSLE create a definition of 'foreign worker' wholly inconsistent with my legislative intent," said Darrell Steinberg, author of SB 477, former California Senator, and current Mayor of Sacramento.

"When SB 477 was signed into law by Governor Brown in 2014, I believed all workers like me would be protected and I cried for joy that others would not have to go through what I did. Today, given the interim regulations interpretation of SB 477, workers like me would not be protected," said Angela Guazon, a human trafficking survivor leader who testified on behalf of the bill in 2013 and 2014 and was trafficked to the US on an O-1 visa.

"Hard-to-staff California public schools rely on teachers trained overseas to meet staff shortages. These teachers are most often recruited through for-profit, independent, recruitment agencies that can and too often do charge the teachers large placement fees, extort excessive labor from them, and threaten their human and professional rights. The state can protect these public school teachers by ensuring SB 477 extends, as intended in the original law, beyond the HB2 visa to include all other international worker visas," said Lora Bartlett, Associate Professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

"As an expert on Philippine global labor migration and a long-time advocate for Filipino migrant workers, I have seen first hand how international labor recruiters have unscrupulously exploited migrants from the Philippines across a range of visa categories. From special education teachers who are brought into California's public schools as J1 visa holders to nurses brought in to work in California's hospitals on H1B visas, migrants of all kinds are forced to pay exorbitant recruitment fees, are promised wages far more than they are actually paid, and are put into inhospitable living arrangements. We support the full implementation of SB 477 as it was originally intended, " said Dr. Robyn Magalit Rodriguez, Associate Professor, Asian American Studies at the University of California, Davis, representing the National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON) Greater Sacramento.

"An exorbitant number of persons trafficked in the state of California as cheap labor come from the Philippines. As an organization that provides a voice for and advocates on behalf of Filipino interests in various forums, we demand a stronger implementation of the bill that comprehensively addresses the various mediums by which Filipino workers are trafficked by exploitative employers," said a representative at the Filipino Bar Association of Northern California (FBANC).

"Several of our members were recruited and charged exorbitant fees to work in the US as teachers and welders, but were instead made to work at hotels and care for the elderly and people with disabilities. The scope of SB 477 must be extended to apply to additional visa categories to cover such workers," said a representative at Pilipino Association of Workers and Immigrants (PAWIS) - Silicon Valley.

"NAFCON has provided services to and led campaigns alongside trafficked workers in many industries, including nurses, oil rig workers, teachers, and hotel staff. SB 477 could significantly protect and empower such workers, but it must apply to workers across visa categories and provide for effective enforcement," said a representative at the National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON) - Northern California.

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About CDM
Centro de los Derechos del Migrante, Inc. (CDM) envisions a world where migrant workers' rights are respected and laws and policies reflect their voices. CDM empowers Mexico-based migrant workers to defend and protect their rights as they move between their home communities in Mexico and their workplaces in the United States through education, outreach, and leadership development; intake, evaluation, and referral services; litigation support and direct representation; and policy advocacy. Read more about CDM at www.cdmigrante.org.

About CAST
Led by CEO Kay Buck, CAST is a Los Angeles-based nonprofit and is one of the pioneers of the US anti-trafficking movement. CAST provides life-saving services to survivors of human trafficking and mobilizes citizens to build a future where modern slavery no longer plagues our communities, our city or our world. Through partnerships with over 100 cultural and faith-based community groups, healthcare organizations, government agencies and law enforcement, CAST provides support at every phase of a human trafficking survivor's journey to freedom. In April 2014, CAST's excellent work was honored by President Obama with the Presidential Award for Extraordinary Efforts to Combat Trafficking in Persons. CAST was the first NGO to receive this award.

Supporting organizations
Filipino Bar Association of Northern California (FBANC)
Migrante Napa Solano 707
Migrante Northern San Mateo County (Migrante NSMC)
National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON) - Greater Sacramento
National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON) - Northern California
Pilipino Association of Workers and Immigrants (PAWIS) - Silicon Valley

Media Contact
Evy Peña
Centro de los Derechos del Migrante, Inc. (CDM)
From Mexico: 01-800-590-1773; From the US: 1-855-234-9699 // evy@cdmigrante.org

General relevance - all sectors

Legisladores

Estados Unidos, México, Regional relevance, y National relevance

Inglés y Español