Power At Work Power At Work Blogcast #87: Labor, Right-Wing "Populism,” and Employment-Based Immigration
In this blogcast, Burnes Center for Social Change Senior Fellow Seth Harris is joined by Shannon Lederer, the Director of Immigration Policy at the AFL-CIO, and Daniel Costa, the Director of Immigration Law and Policy Research at EPI, to discuss the systems that allow employers to bring workers temporarily and permanently into the United States to fill their jobs and whether those systems will be reformed during President Trump's second term. Watch now as Shannon and Daniel highlight the integral role that immigrants play in the growth of the American economy, but also how temporary worker programs and employment-based immigration are highly exploitative and essentially indenture workers to their employers. Seth, Shannon and Daniel also discuss the schism in the Republican Party between the businesses that benefit from temporary worker programs and employment-based immigration and right-wing so-called populists who ferociously oppose these programs.
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Shannon Lederer is the Director of Immigration Policy for the AFL-CIO. She works with union affiliates and allies in all sectors of the labor movement to develop and advance policies that promote workers' rights and shared prosperity. In her 17 years in the labor movement, Lederer has focused extensively on efforts to reform our abusive guest-worker programs and regulate the international labor recruitment industry.
Daniel Costa is an attorney and the Director of Immigration Law and Policy Research at the Economic Policy Institute. He was the California Attorney General’s senior advisor on immigration and labor from 2018 to 2019. His commentaries have appeared in publications like The New York Times, Roll Call, Fortune, La Opinión, and others, and he was named one of “20 Immigration Experts to Follow on Twitter” by ABC News.