Our Story

Since its founding, CDM has been driven by its mission to improve the conditions of low-wage workers in the United States. Our story begins in 2004, when Founder and Executive Director Rachel Micah-Jones traveled to Mexico to meet with several of her clients in their home community. Working as a farmworker attorney in rural Florida, Micah-Jones had witnessed the abuse of migrant workers on the job and the powerful threats of retaliation that silenced them. These clients were no exception. When she first spoke with them in a Florida labor camp only a few months before, they had been intimidated, silent. But now, in Mexico, they poured out their stories of oppressive working conditions, waiting hours to speak with her as the daylight faded. It was this experience that formed the idea for CDM: a binational migrant workers’ rights organization that would overcome the border as a barrier to justice.

On Labor Day 2005, led by Micah-Jones and a small, but extraordinarily dedicated staff, CDM opened its doors in Zacatecas. Since then, we have met with more than 38 thousand migrant workers across Mexico to ensure they know their rights before arriving at their workplaces in the US. We have collaborated with workers and allies to recover more than 40 million dollars in unpaid wages, and to establish important legal precedents and policies to protect migrants all along the migrant stream. Today, with headquarters in Mexico City, and offices in Juxtlahuaca, Oaxaca and Baltimore, Maryland, CDM has established itself as a powerful, transnational agent of change.

Board of Directors

Cori Alonso-Yoder
Laurie Burgess
Rodolfo Cordova Alcaraz
Agnieszka Frysman
Liliana Giffen
Liliane Loya
Emiliano Martínez
Juan J. Martínez-Hill
Elizabeth O’Connor
Sarah Paoletti
Joseph Thurakal
Josephine Weinberg

Staff

Rachel Micah-Jones
Executive Director
Abigail Kerfoot
Senior Staff Attorney
Adelina Vásquez Cedillo
Organization and Leadership Development Coordinator
Adriana del Rocio González Serna
Director of Finance
Anayeli García Villa
Development and Outreach Intern
Andy Choi
Director of Operations
Carmen Martinez
Partnerships Manager
Dolores Ramírez
Accountant
Elias Wyncoop
Administrative Coordinator
Elizabeth Mauldin
Policy Director In Memoriam
Francisco Díaz Pinelo
Communications and Media Relations Lead
Jimena de Haro
Director of Communications
Jocelyn Reyes
Director of Outreach, Education, and Leadership Development
Julia Coburn
Director of Projects and Strategic Initiatives
Julia Solórzano
Director of Litigation
Lucía Villarruel
Project Manager/Compliance, Monitoring and Evaluation Officer
Lucy Thames
Project Manager, Outreach
Maribel López
Lead Paralegal
Nadia Islas Navarro
Office Manager and Paralegal
Naomi Jennings
Legal Fellow
Natasha Montes Hernández
Lead Organizer
Rebeca Rodríguez Flores
Outreach and Digital Education Coordinator
Ricardo Ortiz
Campaign Strategist
Shane Crary Ross
Director of Policy and Legal Services

Our Allies

COMPA

Conformed by nonprofit organizations and national and international networks, the Collective National Plan of Development-Migration (Collective PND-Migration) has the objective of promoting the inclusion of migration policy from the approaches of development, human rights and gender in the National Development Plan 2013-2018, through inclusive and democratic participation mechanisms.

Alianza Nacional de Campesinas

Co-founded by CDM, Alianza Nacional de Campesinas (“Alianza de Campesinas”) is the first national farmworker women’s organization in the U. S. created by current and former farmworker women, along with women who hail from farmworker families.

University of Pennsylvania Law School’s Transnational Legal Clinic

Migration that Works is a coalition of labor, migration, civil rights, anti-trafficking organizations and academics advancing a labor migration model that respects the human rights of workers, families and communities and reflects their voices and experiences. Founded in 2011 as the International Labor Recruitment Working Group (ILRWG), Migration that Works is the first coordinated effort to strategically address worker rights abuses across industries and visa categories.