Posts Categorized: Legislation and Politics

Updated materials pertaining to individuals with Temporary Protected Status (TPS) and the reinstatement of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) are now available to locals. Resources, including Spanish-language fact sheets and a sample employer letter, are available here and here.

TPS

TPS is a form of immigration relief available to individuals from certain countries where there is ongoing armed conflict, a natural disaster, or other extraordinary conditions that prevent people from returning safely.  

On December 9, 2020, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) published a Federal Register Notice automatically extending the validity of documents related to TPS, including work authorizations, for individuals from El Salvador, Haiti, Nicaragua, Sudan, Nepal and Honduras through Oct. 4, 2021. This extension complies with a recent decision in the federal Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Other legal challenges to the Trump Administration’s decision to terminate these six countries’ TPS designations are ongoing, and the Biden Administration is expected to extend and expand TPS designations even further. The Biden Administration has proposed legislation that will make green cards and a path to citizenship available to TPS holders.

Workers who re-enrolled during the last designated TPS registration period benefit automatically from the Dec. 9 extension. No worker needs to reapply for this extension.

If a worker’s employment authorization document (EAD) expires before Oct. 4, 2021, the worker should keep a copy of the Dec. 9, 2020 Federal Register Notice. If an employer questions the validity of an EAD, all a worker needs to show is their EAD and a copy of this Federal Register Notice.

DACA

DACA is a U.S. immigration policy that allows some individuals who were brought to the country as children (“Dreamers”) to receive a renewable two-year period of deferred action from deportation and become eligible for a work permit in the U.S.

On his very first day, President Biden issued a memorandum directing DHS and the Attorney General to take all appropriate actions to preserve and fortify DACA. The Biden Administration has proposed legislation that would establish a path to citizenship for DACA recipients.

On Dec. 4, 2020, a New York federal court ordered DHS to restore DACA to its original form. As a result, USCIS is accepting first-time DACA applications, DACA renewal requests, applications for advanced parole (travel) documents, and extending DACA grants and one-year employment authorization documents to two years.

The UFCW was among the plaintiffs in a separate Supreme Court case that overturned the Trump Administration’s termination of DACA in June 2020 as a violation of the Administrative Procedure Act.

The UFCW is supporting efforts by the new Congress and the Biden Administration to support immigrant workers and will keep everyone updated.

If you have any questions regarding TPS and DACA, please have your Region Director contact Sarai King at sking@ufcw.org in the International’s Legal Department.

On Jan. 6, the UFCW applauded the election of Reverend Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff in the U.S. Senate runoff in Georgia, calling it a victory for working families.

“Georgia voters delivered a powerful message with the election of Reverend Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff, declaring that hard-working men and women, and their concerns and issues, must come first,” said UFCW International President Marc Perrone in a statement. “Over a million hard-working UFCW members have been on the frontlines of the pandemic, bravely putting their own health at risk in grocery stores, pharmacies, senior care facilities, and meatpacking plants to ensure that America’s families have the food and care they need during this crisis.”

“As COVID-19 cases continue to spread across this nation, there has never been a more important time for new leaders who will finally put frontline workers first and stand up for the health care, hazard pay, and vital safety protections they need,” Perrone added. “UFCW members across Georgia and every state were proud to help get out the vote and are ready to work with the new Democratic majority and Senators-elect Warnock and Ossoff to deliver the positive and real change our country and families need.”

Our union represents over 20,000 hard-working men and women in the state of Georgia, many of whom are essential workers on the frontlines of this pandemic. Our members, who are represented by UFCW Local 1996, played an important role in this election and helped to get out the vote through member to member outreach and phone banking. UFCW Local 1996 also worked with Ossoff to call for more protections for Georgia’s essential workers leading up to the election.

Our member-to-member program that has been built on years of engagement made over 40,000 phone calls to members and had over 3,000 conversations. We were able to get hundreds of members who did not vote in the 2020 general election to vote early for the runoff races.  With the data available to date, we estimate that 40 percent of the eligible membership voted early in the runoffs.  Final data will not be available until around spring of this year to know the final turnout in both the November general election and January runoff election.

To reach members, we utilized phone banking, Hustle banks, mail, digital ads, vote tripling, hand-written postcards and also engaged members with 300 organic social media shares by fellow members. We also produced videos with both candidates, like this one with Warnock, and hustled them out to members.

We would like to thank the staff from UFCW Local 7R and 367, who joined staff from the International and were on the ground with the New Georgia Project.  

International Vice President and Director of the Legislative and Political Action Department Ademola Oyefeso summed up the work in Georgia, emphasizing the UFCW’s long-term engagement in the state. “Our collective work in Georgia puts working people on a level playing field with corporate interests for the first time in over a decade in Washington, D.C.,” he said. “The work we did with progressive partners in Georgia did not start on November 4, 2020. This has been over a decade in the making of a plan to change Georgia’s electoral landscape by consistently engaging black voters and new Americans. In November 2020 and January 2021, we saw the fruit of our collective labor. Make no mistake, collective change in any state takes real resources, collaboration, compromise and dedication. The years of work with our membership and growing ABC contributions is what helped the UFCW be a real partner in the 2020 and 2021 victories in Georgia.”