WHEREAS, America’s immigration system is badly broken, and President Trump’s disgraceful enforcement policies are an affront to our nation’s values.

WHEREAS, instead of ensuring the safety of workers doing dangerous and difficult jobs, the Trump administration is raiding our workplaces, arresting our members and letting corporations get off scot free.

WHEREAS, rejecting a sacred American tradition of welcoming refugees and asylum seekers, the Trump administration has instead turned away those fleeing violence, shamefully imprisoning aspiring Americans for profit and tearing them from their children.

WHEREAS, the Department of Justice’s changes to the asylum system may be a death sentence for persecuted LGBTQ Central Americans. According to a 2017 Amnesty International report, attacks on LGBTQ people are rampant in Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, with 264 murders in Honduras alone between 2009 and July 2017.

WHEREAS, Roxana Hernández, a transgender Honduran migrant who traveled to the United States in a migrant caravan through Mexico, recently died while in the custody of American immigration officials following a five-day detention in what’s known by immigrant rights groups as the “ice box.”

WHERAS, instead of expanding rights and protections for those who do the hard work of our nation, the Trump administration is directly attacking a million working people with Temporary Protected Status and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, needlessly stripping them of their rights and making them once again subject to exploitation, deportation and separation from their loved ones.

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, Pride at Work opposes immigration enforcement tactics that breed fear and chill the exercise of basic workplace rights. We reject family and child detention, the “zero tolerance” policy at the border and any limits on due process for vulnerable populations. We insist that the way to raise wages and standards is by empowering workers and creating pathways to citizenship for all those whose labor allows our country to prosper.

THEREFORE BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED, we remain committed to the ongoing struggle to build an immigration system that lifts people up and ensures that we are all able to live and work with dignity, regardless of where we were born. We know that real security can only be achieved through humane approaches, and we will continue to demand justice for our communities, our workforce, our unions and all those seeking refuge here.

Submitted by Tim Schlittner, Co-President of Pride at Work
Approved August 25, 2018