Laura Gómez moderates a conversation with Yvette Borja, Laura E. Gómez Latinx People and the Law Teaching Fellow, UCLA School of Law, Gabriela Ibañez Guzmán, staff attorney at Somos Un Pueblo Unido, Mariel Bustamante, PhD student at the UC Berkeley School of Jurisprudence and Social Policy, Emily Morel, community organizer with Red De DefensAZ, and Alejandra Pablos, co-founder of Red De DefensAZ. They discuss the successful policies passed in New Mexico during the last 25 years that allow immigrant New Mexicans to pursue higher education and workforce training, obtain driver’s licenses, receive protection from wage theft and discrimination, and access state guaranteed-basic-income pilots. By contrast, Arizona has passed several anti-immigrant laws, including a ban on cities passing sanctuary policies, served as the center stage for racist policing as immigration enforcement, and is home to many localities that use immigration detention centers as a means for economic development. But Arizona has also served as an incubator for participatory defense community organizing led by directly impacted people, from Puente to Red De DefensAZ. This roundtable explored the reasons behind these divergences and what they can teach us about non-carceral futures in the Southwest.
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