On June 17, 2015 Daniel Werner Senior, Supervising Attorney at Southern Poverty Law Center, was honored to testify in front of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.\u00a0 Werner opened by addressing the issue of retaliation against immigrant and migrant workers as a particularly susceptible demographic for three principle reasons.\u00a0 He cited abusive employer threats of deportation, lack of portability between jobs due to visa restrictions, and lack of resources in workers\u2019 home countries to support reintegration and fairness upon dismissal or decision to leave a position.<\/p>\n
Werner went on to produce recommendations for the establishment and enforcement of tactics to combat these barriers.\u00a0\u00a0Werner stressed that reducing vulnerability of immigrant and migrant workers to retaliation requires in part political solutions<\/strong>, including comprehensive immigration reforms, tightened controls over foreign labor recruitment markets, legislative fixes, and development of civil society resources in other countries.<\/p>\n Some concrete steps were also outlined to expedite the process of implementation:<\/p>\n Werner notes that in many cases, retaliation or the threat of retaliation is a central component of the coercion traffickers use to maintain compliance from workers. He suggests that when the EEOC has identified retaliation against immigrant workers, it should automatically assess whether the retaliation rises to the level of human trafficking.<\/p>\n\n