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Fighting for workers’ rights under a TN visa in the automobile industry

Centro de los Derechos del Migrante, Inc., along with lawyers in Georgia, has sued Hyundai Mobis, an automobile manufacturer as well as their recruitment agencies for defrauding the United States government and dozens of Mexicans  with engineering and technical expertise, scammed to work as assembly-line workers in Georgia.

Workers were hired as engineers and technicians on TN visas, created under the North American Free Trade Agreement, now T-MEC, which allows Canadian and Mexican professionals to fill highly-qualified posts in the United States. According to the list published by the Department of State, engineering and technician posts are covered by the TN program. However, assembly lines are not. Once in Georgia, professionals were sent to work at plants doing manual labor of repetitive production for 12-hour shifts, six days a week, on a low salary.

“This is a landmark case in this region and industry where employers at said production lines are wrongly using TN visas” said Ben Botts, Legal Director at CDM.

This lawsuit also includes employment discrimination since Mexican workers claimed that they are being paid less than their American counterparts despite doing the same or similar work. That is, they received lower wages due to their nationality and ethnic background. In addition to seeking justice for workers that have been defrauded, CDM is the only non-profit organization in Mexico pushing U. S. authorities to ensure the compliance of the program.

If you are in a similar situation at work, call Centro de los Derechos del Migrante, Inc. (CDM) at 800 590 1773 (Mexico) or +1 855 234 9699 (United States) from Monday to Friday between 9:00 and 17:00 hours.

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