U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis came to Immokalee today, sent by President Obama to look first-hand into the human rights crisis in Florida’s fields.

No trip to Immokalee would be complete without a visit to the CIW community center, of course, and Sec. Solis’ visit was no exception. The Secretary’s visit with the CIW lasted for an hour and a half, the highlight of which, for all involved, was her personal tour of the CIW’s groundbreaking Modern-Day Slavery Museum. Here above she is pictured inside the cargo truck that is the centerpiece of the museum with Leonel Perez of the CIW and Laura Germino (far left), Coordinator of the CIW’s Anti-Slavery Campaign.

Sec. Solis also came to Immokalee — the heart of the farmworker movement for human rights in Florida — to express the administration’s strong support for farmworkers “in the fight against labor abuses.”

Here she delivers that message as she meets the press inside the CIW center following her meeting with CIW members and the museum tour.

But Sec. Solis’ visit to the CIW began with a meeting with a very different kind of press — with the crew of the morning show on the CIW’s own community radio station, Radio Conciencia…

… where Lucas Benitez led the interview and Gerardo Reyes ran the soundboard. Sec. Solis was generous enough to answer several questions for the farmworker community about her visit, including one about her own personal connection to the fields: Sec. Solis’s father was a “bracero,” one of hundreds of thousands of farmworkers in the western states whose exploitation during and after World War II was a national disgrace. Lucas and the Secretary discussed the special insight her own family’s history provides her as she faces the challenges of enforcing the nation’s labor laws.

Then it was time for a quick get together with a few CIW members and staff, where Sec. Solis presented the CIW with a very special, signed plaque bearing a quote by Cesar Chavez, which read:

“Once social change begins, it cannot be reversed. You cannot uneducate the person who has learned to read. You cannot humiliate the person who feels pride. You cannot oppress the people who are not afraid anymore.”

Sec. Solis said she hoped the plaque would serve as inspiration for the CIW to continue leading the fight for dignity and human rights that Cesar Chavez started.

A short but in-depth discussion followed about exactly that — the CIW’s efforts to forge a more humane agricultural industry in Florida and how the Department of Labor could support those efforts.

The promise of a significant increase in enforcement resources and a closer, more coordinated relationship between Department of Labor investigators and the CIW in addressing labor violations was genuine and unequivocal.

Then it was on to the slavery museum, mounted especially for the Secretary’s visit in the community center’s backyard.

The tour began with a look at the evolution of forced labor in Florida before the modern era, beginning with the state’s history of chattel slavery and how that most brutal form of slavery gave way to newer, still legal forms, such as the convict-lease system and debt bondage, in the post-Civil War period.

The tour continued with a look at the first half of the 20th century, a period popularly referred to in Florida as the “Harvest of Shame,” named after the famous Edward R. Murrow documentary, broadcast on the day after Thanksgiving 1960, that exposed the exploitation and degradation of Florida’s farmworkers.

Then, moving from the first half of the 20th century to the present day on the way to the cargo truck and the exhibit of the most recent slavery prosecutions in Florida, the Secretary is shown a painting of a tractor, signed by hundreds of Immokalee workers in 1999, that reads “I am not a tractor!” The image refers to a now infamous quote by an anonymous tomato farmer who answered a question about why Immokalee tomato growers refused to meet with the CIW even after six CIW members held a month-long hunger strike with one demand: dialogue. The grower responded:

“Let me put it to you like this: The tractor doesn’t tell the farmer how to run the farm.”

The cry “I am not a tractor” launched the CIW’s 1999 general strike in Immokalee.

Next, it was into the cargo truck — a replica of the truck used to hold workers captive in the very latest slavery prosecution — that houses exhibits drawn from court transcripts and media records of the seven slavery prosecutions to take place in Florida in the last dozen years. Here, the Secretary views chains like those used to bind workers’ hands by the brutal Navarrete family of farm bosses. The chains selected for the museum, like much of the exhibit on the Navarrete prosecution, were chosen based on court documents and in consultation with several of the victims themselves.

The tour of the truck continued, with the Secretary reviewing details of the other recent prosecutions, including U.S. v. Flores — a seminal case that was instrumental in establishing the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, which is used to prosecute slavery operations today — and U.S. v. Ramos, an investigation and prosecution that is highlighted in the New Yorker article “Nobodies,” which later became a best-selling book by the same name.

The Secretary was deeply engaged throughout the museum tour and clearly moved by many of the exhibits.

Finally back outside the truck, the tour wrapped up with the final two exhibits, examining the roots of forced labor in agriculture — with a focus on farmworker poverty and powerlessness — and finishing with the solution: the CIW’s Campaign for Fair Food, that seeks to harness the market power of the major buyers of Florida produce to demand higher labor standards and respect for human rights — including zero tolerance for slavery — from their suppliers.

The final panel included a surprise for the Secretary. The picture at the bottom right of the panel with a blue background is a photo from last September at the announcement ceremony in Washington, DC, of the CIW’s agreement with Compass Group, where Secretary Solis spoke in support of the growing partnership for Fair Food and stood, in the blue blazer, with representatives of the CIW, Compass Group, and East Coast Farms, the first major tomato grower to agree to work under the terms of the Fair Food code of conduct!

The CIW is deeply grateful for the Secretary’s visit and for the administration’s clear demonstration of support for human rights and a more modern agricultural industry in Florida. We look forward to working together in the future in addressing labor rights violations and labor reform for Florida’s farmworkers.