Marlene Galaz
Cynthia Marlene Galaz (Marlene) brings over eight years of experience advocating for immigrant communities, workers, and incarcerated individuals. As the Director of the New York immigration Coalition (NYIC), she leads the organization’s priority state legislative and budget campaigns, along with federal policy initiatives aimed at strengthening the fundamental rights of immigrant New Yorkers. Previously, at Freedom for Immigrants, Marlene worked on federal and state initiatives to end immigration detention. She also directed a program that monitored human rights abuses in immigration prisons across the United States. Her findings on dangerous and abusive conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic prompted the first calls for mass release from federal elected officials. Marlene holds an MSc in Social Policy from the University of Oxford and a BA in Global Studies with a minor in Public Affairs from UCLA.