Contact: Joe Shansky (414) 218-3331, joe@vdlf.org
Study uses two Wisconsin cases to point to opportunities for reform in current immigration debate
With federal immigration reform under serious consideration in Congress, a report co-released Tuesday by the National Employment Law Project (NELP) and Voces de la Frontera, a Milwaukee based immigrants rights group, show how immigration policies intended to stop employers from hiring undocumented workers have instead allowed unscrupulous employers to evade both immigration and labor laws.
The report, titled “Workers’ Rights on ICE — How Immigration Reform Can Stop Retaliation and Advance Labor Rights”, is now available at: http://tinyurl.com/nelpretaliation.
The report features two case studies of workers in the Milwaukee area. In one case, Omar Damian-Ortega, a welder who suffered an injury on the job is facing deportation because his health insurance company accused him of identify theft after he appealed his workers compensation claim. In the second case, a group of 75 factory workers at Palermo’s Pizza in Milwaukee were fired when their employer accused them of failure to reverify their work status after workers attempted to organize a union for safer working conditions and a voice on the job.
In addition to highlighting some of the most common ways that some employers exploit our broken immigration system and illustrating these methods with specific examples, the report offers key recommendations for immigration reform legislation.
