It took three months for A. B. to find a stable job after migrating from Ecuador to New York in late 2017. The job — helping make shoes for a store in Manhattan — gave her instant relief and hopes for financial stability.
But A. B., who did not have legal status, never imagined the job would turn into five years of exploitation.
“I was insulted thousands of times,” A. B. said in Spanish, who requested the use of her initials to protect her identity. “Those thousands of times I went to the restroom to cry often, then washed my face and returned to work.”
In 2022, A. B. left the company. Having allegedly suffered years of exploitation, she filed a complaint with the New York State Division of Human Rights for unlawful discriminatory practices in violation of the State’s employment discrimination laws.
Her lawyers also recommended that she apply for the Deferred Action for Labor Enforcement (DALE) program. For nearly two years, starting from the program’s implementation in 2023 under the Biden administration to its abrupt end under the Trump administration in 2025, the DALE program allowed 7,700 workers involved in labor investigations about workplace abuse to obtain temporary work authorization. As part of its goals, it also sought to protect undocumented workers from retaliation by employers based on their immigration status, and encourage reporting unsafe conditions and workplace abuses.
A. B.’s lawyers planned to submit an application on her behalf, but the Trump administration quietly ended the program before they could, leaving her in the same precarious immigration status that she says enabled her years of exploitation.
For decades, reports have shown that workers without legal status have faced exploitation in industries that typically rely on workers without legal status, and that these incidents often go unreported due to fear of retaliation. Workplace exploitation can take many forms, including sexual harassment, retaliation, wage theft and more.
Advocates now warn that under the Trump administration, more migrants are likely to face exploitation in the workplace — especially as the DALE program has been rolled back.
Both sources in this story requested Documented not to include the name of the companies they worked at due to fear of retaliation.
A. B., who is in her forties, told Documented that her manager often made sexual remarks, and encouraged her to leave her husband to live with him. She said that whenever she pushed back, the manager demanded she be thankful because no one else would hire her because of her immigration status. Documented reviewed her claims, which are also included in the lawsuit.
“I had no choice … I was the support of my children and my family,” she said. “I prayed often that he would change.” During her years there, she alleges that other women workers also left the job because of workplace harassment.
And, while she was hired as a shoemaker, her responsibilities grew over the years. She said she was told to clean the toilets and the office, though it was never mentioned that she would be responsible for those tasks during her hiring process.
A. B. explained that it was not until she sought help from Representative Catalina Cruz’s office in Queens that she learned she was a victim of sexual harassment and workplace exploitation.
“That was when I knew that what I had endured for years was a crime,” she said. “Because while at work, I only knew suffering and fear and that was all.”
Mel González, project director of the Employment Law Project at the New York Legal Assistance Group (NYLAG), the organization that represented A. B. in the lawsuit, said that cases like A. B.’s are very common, especially among immigrant women in male-dominated industries.
“Even with all these numbers, they don’t reflect the full scope of what’s actually happening out there,” he said. “It happens all the time.”
A. B.’s case took four years to settle. González said the length of the case reflects how agencies at the city and state level who are responsible for enforcing anti-discrimination laws, have fallen short because of staffing or lack of funds. He added that the system also neglects non-English speakers.
“The whole translation setup for the hearing was completely inadequate,” said González. “We had a translator who was there 100% of the time, and she was amazing, but it was very clear that so much was being lost.”
González believes A. B. would have qualified for DALE had it been available. Instead, A. B. has applied for a U-visa, which could take anywhere from five to 10 years to receive a final approval after the initial application is submitted.
A U-visa is a nonimmigrant visa that allows victims of certain crimes to live and work in the United States for up to four years. Applicants may be eligible for this visa if they have suffered substantial mental or physical abuse resulting from a crime. Those seeking a U-visa status can apply for a work permit after a bona fide determination has been made. USCIS does not have an average timeframe available for bona fide determinations, but some law firms have estimates that it takes 35 months.
González emphasized that DALE’s primary goal was all about law enforcement; in ensuring that businesses like the one where A. B. worked follow employment laws that protect all workers in the U.S., regardless of immigration status. “So many immigrants deal with violations of those protections, and DALE was really exciting for that reason,” he said.
He added that workers like A. B. have to be part of the law enforcement process to hold employers accountable. “The whole thing depended on her testimony.”
He noted that labor investigations often take a long time and need the clients present for the investigation. “By the time it picks up, a lot of workers are either deported or voluntarily go back to their home country,” he explained. “Getting immigration relief from DALE helped people speak up.”
Other workers have also been impacted by the rollback of the program, said Diego Fernandez, workplace attorney at Make The Road, a nonprofit organization that provides resources and legal services to immigrant communities.
“We used to do a lot of deferred action for labor enforcement work,” he said, adding that now people have been reluctant to report cases of worksite exploitation. “I’ve had multiple clients who have been ready to file a complaint, but then pulled back, because they were like, well, actually, I don’t know what this employer is going to do to me.”
He said that his work now has shifted from filing cases like DALE to informing people about their rights if their employer threatens to call ICE. “A lot of my work is focused more on retaliation and how to stop retaliation. The workers’ anxiety is through the roof.”
Fernandez said that he has also seen low-wage workers remaining at exploitative jobs to make ends meet, like A. B. who made $13 an hour when she started her job in 2017, the minimum wage required by New York State for employers with more than 11 workers.
A March report by the Mayor’s Office of Equity and Racial Justice, “NYC True Cost of Living Measure,” sought to calculate the real cost for families in the city to cover necessities — like housing, food, childcare, health care, and others.
The report found that 78% of Hispanic New Yorkers currently do not have the resources needed to meet their true cost of living. By assessing the resources necessary for individuals and families to be independent of public and private assistance, the report determined that Hispanic families were facing an annual shortfall of nearly $10,000 more than white families.
For families like Doris’, a migrant from Mexico living in Brooklyn who shared only her first name, losing a source of income can add to the economic hardship she already feels. She said it only took her one week of being hospitalized to be fired from her restaurant job of nearly seven years.
“With how things are, everything is expensive lately, especially the rent with three kids. I am desperate,” she said, explaining that the job gave her flexibility to work around her husband’s schedule and alternate taking care of their three children. “We did not want the children to be alone and it is hard to trust strangers to take care of them.”
She said the loss of her employment in April has been detrimental to her household, as her husband is now the sole provider. Despite claiming that her manager sexually harassed her, Doris said she would consider returning to the restaurant to continue providing for her children.
“I am very sad because finding a job is very difficult right now,” she said, crying on the phone. “They fired me just like that.”
