Last week, our staff had the wonderful opportunity to attend the annual National Immigrant Inclusion Conference (NIIC). Created by the National Partnership for New Americans (NPNA), NIIC is the nation’s largest gathering of diverse leaders, advocates and supporters working on behalf of our country’s immigrants and refugees. Launched in 2008, NIIC draws over 1,000 allies from more than 450 organizations across the U.S. and international partners from Canada, Europe, Mexico and beyond.
MIRA’s Director of State Government Affairs, Amy Grunder was a speaker at this year’s conference! In a fully packed and engaged room, Amy and her fellow panelists presented on the role of state and local government offices in developing and advocating for immigrant workforce initiatives and policies, in collaboration with advocacy organizations like MIRA. She presented on the recent passage of the Physician Pathway Act, and emphasized how the role of key stakeholders in MIRA’s successful campaign, including key healthcare and business leaders, the Massachusetts Governor, the Massachusetts Office for Refugees and Immigrants, and especially the immigrant physicians who inspired and informed our work, passionately helped advocate for this bill. Their collaboration and support is what made this victory possible for Massachusetts.
Our Communications Specialist, Farah Jeune was excited to network with fellow content creators and learn some of the various unique strategies they use to amplify immigrant voices across social media platforms. With the massive spread of misinformation (particularly in languages other than English) and algorithmic bias that negatively suppresses immigrant voices, it’s going to be crucial for all pro-immigrant leaders to learn how we can use this digital energy (rather good or bad) and transform it into real-world action. The MIRA Communications team looks forward to investing in more intersectional narrative work around immigration so we can continue to support and amplify immigrant voices to influence public opinion and policy choices.
Our Senior Director of Programs, Stephanie Rosario Rodriguez’s biggest takeaway was the importance of coordinated grassroots services such as DOJ accreditation and cross collaboration with other national organizations so we can all learn and apply some of the innovative approaches to strengthening & growing legal services for immigrants in this country. We are proud to say that this year, MIRA’s team successfully helped 3,279 individuals apply for Temporary Protected Status (TPS), directly trained 706 individuals for our Know Your Rights presentations and expanded DOJ accreditation!
There were so many amazing speakers at this year’s NIIC conference and a quote that stood out the most to MIRA’s Executive Director, Liz Sweet, was “let’s not panic at their disco.” Executive Director of the Narrative Initiative, Rinku Sen, reminded the audience that although we do have a tough road ahead of us with the upcoming Trump administration, we must remember to stay focused and connected. Unfortunately, as more fear and hatred will be directed towards our immigrants, especially those with mixed statuses, it is vital that we remain unified and do everything in our power to mobilize, so our movement can thrive.
Thank you National Partnership for New Americans (NPNA), for creating this safe space. To find out how you can continue to support the MIRA Coalition’s work, visit our website and get involved with us.