SACRAMENTO, Calif. — "Newsom, Newsom, we aren't tired! We won't stop until we're hired!" was just one of the chants echoed loudly through the streets of downtown Sacramento Thursday by hundreds of college students all across California.
Each chant shared one common thread, calling for Governor Gavin Newsom to sign a bill that would open more job opportunities for all students, regardless of their immigration status.
Assembly Bill 2586, also known as the Opportunity for All Act, was introduced by Assemblymember David Alvarez (D-San Diego). The bill calls for University of California, California State University and California community college systems to provide equal access to on-campus employment opportunities for undocumented students. The bill passed the Legislature in a 41-7 Assembly vote in August and now sits on Newsom's desk.
If signed into law, California would become the first state in the nation to adopt such a policy, which could impact the nearly 87,000 undocumented students in the state pursuing higher education.
Thursday's rally and march started at César Chávez Plaza and concluded with a news conference at the State Capitol, which included speeches from students and Assemblymember Alvarez, among others. The event was part of a larger effort led by the Opportunity for All (O4A) coalition, which has advocated for employment opportunities for undocumented students, starting with UC campuses, since fall 2022.
It's an effort that is personal for Jeffry Umaña Muñoz, one of the lead organizers for the Opportunity for All campaign.
"While I was at UCLA, I had a job offer with the UCLA Labor Center to be an undergraduate student researcher. That would have helped me pay for my tuition, pay for my housing, retain myself educationally, and I was unable to take that job because the University of California imposes a ban on hiring undocumented workers," Umaña Muñoz said.
Now a graduate student at California State University, Los Angeles, he shared he is still looking forward to applying his skills on-campus.
"There's a plethora of opportunities that would help me advance my career to be able to teach, to be able to work with the community... And so those are the opportunities that I would like to access," Umaña Muñoz said.
From supporting student services through campus bookstores to serving as teaching assistants, Umaña Muñoz stated the opportunities students want to pursue in on-campus employment is wide and varied.
"Regardless of the career path, there's a way for undocumented students to be able to expand and further their careers and educational goals at their universities. And so this bill would allow them access to apply to those jobs," he said.
Paola Rocha is a first-year, first-generation college student at University of California, Merced studying public health with an emphasis in pre-med. When she moved to California from Culiacán, Sinaloa in Mexico, she was told repeatedly she wouldn't be granted opportunities because she was undocumented.
"Everybody told me that I couldn't go to school, that I wouldn't be able to pay tuition, that I would be working any job that comes my way because I don't have a social security number," Rocha said.
Now, she's writing her own story and hopes the passage of the bill will help her.
"I'm here to stay, and I don't want to be working and doing something that I'm not really passionate about. My passion has always been medicine," Rocha said.
Umaña Muñoz emphasized the ask is simple.
"All that we're asking for is the right to apply. This policy will not grant us any federal immigration protections that will make us any more safer. You know, it doesn't impact federal immigration policy at all," he said. "All that it does is it levels the playing field in California's public university systems where the state had already committed to a level playing field for every student, regardless of immigration status."
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