Plenary Speaker, Opening Session
Victoria Gavito is Legal Director at Centro de los Derechos del Migrante, Inc. CDM is the first transnational workers' rights law center based in central Mexico. CDM was founded to address the intimidation factor that prevents many (im)migrants from connecting with advocates in the United States and to address abuses that accompany migrant work in the US. CDM is located in Zacatecas, in the heart of Mexico, because it is nearly impossible for Mexican migrant and "guest" workers, who by definition have no permanent home in the US, to fight the problems they face in the workplace without a source of support for those battles in their home country. Prior to joining CDM, Victoria was a New Voices Fellow and Yale Initiative for Public Interest Law Grantee to work as Employment Rights Counsel for the Central Texas Immigrant Workers' Right Center and the Equal Justice Center in Austin, Texas. Victoria recovered over $550, 000.00 in unpaid wages for low-wage immigrant workers in central Texas. Victoria's recently published article, The Pursuit of Justice is Without Borders: Binational Strategies for Defending Migrants' Rights, was published by the Human Rights Brief and can be found at http://www.wcl.american.edu/hrbrief/14/3gavito.pdf?rd=1
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