Fil-Am lawyer donates $10K for immigrant workers’ rights

Attorney C. Joe Sayas. WEBSITE/Ding Carreon

LOS ANGELES – A Filipino American lawyer donated $10,000 to a community advocacy group to help efforts in educating immigrants about their rights as tension over immigration roils US politics.

The Law Offices of C. Joe Sayas, Jr. donated $10,000 to the Pilipino Workers Center (PWC) to support PWC’s Employment, Education and Outreach program (“EMPLEO”), which offers a hotline available to any Fil-Am worker who seeks information on their rights as a worker.

Workers of Filipino descent can contact the confidential hotline at 1- 877-TULONG1, and their questions can be answered in Tagalog, Visayan, or Ilocano.

“Today’s politics convey anti-immigrant messages, all of which created a wave of concern among immigrant workers, especially the undocumented, most of whom are not fully aware of their rights. Today, more than ever, this vulnerable population needs to be informed of their rights in the workplace,” according the firm’s press statement.

Attorney C. Joe Sayas, Jr., the firm’s founder, has been a supporter of immigrant communities.   “Immigrant workers’ rights are important civil rights,” Sayas said at an event at PWC attended by lawyers from the Department of Labor, the Equal Opportunity Commission and the Philippine Consulate.

Sayas stressed the importance of “protecting workers’ rights “because when you help workers, you also help their families and their children who depend on them.”