IMMIGRANT RIGHTS AND KOREAN IMMIGRANT WORKERS ADVOCATES (KIWA)

From the Chinese Exclusion Act and the Alien Land Laws to the roundup of the first generation Issei right after Pearl Harbor, Japanese and Asian Americans are all too familiar with the treatment of immigrants in this country.

In 1994, Proposition 187 or the "Save Our State" initiative was on the California ballot when many people were still suffering the effects of a stiff recession. It proposed to deny services, such as education and healthcare to the undocumented and it required that teachers and administrators identify and turn away students without legal papers. Japanese Americans and other Asians marched with thousands of people of different ethnic backgrounds along Cesar Chavez Avenue supporting the rights of immigrants to live, work and learn without fear in this country. Although the proposition passed, it was challenged in the courts and pronounced unconstitutional. Proponents of the first Prop 187 are busy again fashioning a new "187" which will again deny services and rights to immigrants.

The Korean Immigrant Workers Advocates (KIWA) has dedicated itself to supporting the rights of both Korean and Latino workers in Koreatown. It has challenged restaurant owners who were cheating workers out of their pay and helped to organize the Restaurant Workers Association. When workers from the ASSI Market in Koreatown approached KIWA, a plan to unionize workers across the Korean supermarket industry was initiated and the Immigrant Workers Union was born. KIWA continues to remind us of our own history as immigrants struggling for our rights in this country.