The National Coalition for Dignity and Amnesty for Immigrants comprises unions, labor groups, and organizations that fight for the rights of illegal immigrants and immigrants in general. The KWRU is participating in the campaign for an unconditional amnesty for all immigrants. The campaign has been launched by the AFL-CIO as a response to the denial of basic human rights to those immigrants by most part of this society and their reality of outcrying marginalization.

Contemptuously called "illegal aliens," decent and hard-working people are rejected while they are contributing to the accumulation of wealth in this country. They work for low salaries without benefits, without medical care suffering discrimination and exploitation.

The immigrants' living conditions are contrary to the Declaration of Universal Human Rights approved by the United Nations which states in Article 23 "the right to jobs at a living wage and just conditions of work"; in Article 25 "the right to wellbeing of a person and their family including food, clothing, housing, and medical care and necessary social services; and in Article 26 "the right to education".

Many immigrants have come to the "country of opportunities," as I call this country of marketing, to find a living. They have found themselves trapped, however, in a society that does not recognize them, that isolates them and that does not provide them the most basic rights.

In most of this country's shelters, for instance, nobody is admitted without pertinent identity papers and I understand it is unjust to leave folks abandoned on the streets only because they lack identity documents. On the other hand, the programs for visiting workers are just used for getting a cheap labor force leading almost back to slavery. Unscrupulous businessmen and their managers are taking advantage of the illegal status of immigrants and abuse them. Laws are not enforced against those abusers but only against immigrants.

Many immigrants have to face serious consequences when they defend their human rights. In the AFL-CIO forum on June 3rd, 2000, a woman told her story. She did not dare to give her name fearing to suffer reprisals later on. This woman worked in a hotel in Minneapolis under exploitive conditions: without being allowed to take a break, she had to clean seventeen rooms within less than four hours. When she tried to unite with other workers, her boss got mad and made them even work harder. He hired more people to break the union. The workers fought together though and won the fight. After their victory, however, the manager abused even more and finally called Immigration to take them away. They were taken to prison and locked in for seven days being treated like criminals. That woman's boss had even sexually abused her and humiliated her in a subhuman way. The union, joined by the community and Father Eduardo, filed a complaint against the company.

The story of that anonymous woman reflects a common situation, much more common than we can imagine. There are agencies that change their name after eight hours, change workteams and transports to hide their exploitive and criminal behavior towards decent immigrant workers. Many people are fired after having an accident. Many well educated and trained people receive much less pay than their co-workers. These exploitation centers continue operating and many of them are supposedly legal and receive government support.

Due to their illegal status, exploited immigrants have no organizational means and no institutions to go to claim and defend their rights. Since their mere subsistence, and the subsistence of their kids depends on whatever pay for whatever work, they continue exposed to whatever moral and economic injustice and racism, they continue to have to submit to infrahuman conditions, to keep quiet and to hide unless a general amnesty in granted. Amnesty for immigrants is even more of a moral imperative for this society if we think about their kids who grow in subhuman living conditions and must feel they are not worth a life of dignity. And our fight for amnesty and economic human rights is about the kids for the kids are our future.