My name's Zeke. I am currently seeking immigration justice, but having used up all my savings and with no family support, I am turning to your kindness for help. I came to the United States in 2015 on a student visa wanting to pursue higher education, fulfilling a childhood dream of completing a PhD. I did not expect to be trafficked by my doctoral program at Penn State using a loophole that exists between US immigration and labor law. I cannot return to my country of origin after protesting its mandatory conscription laws by threatening them with political suicide.

The above email from my ex-boss is the response I received when I asked if I would still be in legal status the next day, to give you an example of the workplace abuse I was subject to. Whatever you contribute will go towards finding and retaining a suitable lawyer; food, medicine, and transport; rent and related living expenses; and medical expenses.

Here is the story of how I was trafficked.

After completing my undergraduate degree at NYU in 2019, I successfully applied for and accepted a position at Penn State as an MA student, funded by the Graduate Instructor package offered by my program at the English department, where I was contracted to teach Freshman Composition. This package was supposed to cover tuition, 80% of my health insurance, and provide me with compensation for teaching said classes.

During the 2020-21 academic year, I successfully applied once again to continue my studies at the doctoral level at the English department at Penn State. This required an update of my visa status to reflect the change in education level from Master's to Doctoral. After signing a new contract for doctoral study and funding, my department and I were notified by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) that the funding package mentioned above was $1800 short of meeting the requirements for my visa. This $1800 correlates to the same amount of money that was supposed to be part of our COLA (Cost of Living Adjustments) that unfortunately got frozen as part of austerity measures at Penn State during the COVID-19 lockdown.

On top of this, the news was only broken to me the week of Thanksgiving, which was only three weeks before finals would have been due. To keep me from lapsing from my status, I was forced to hand over personal financial documents to my department regarding my rent, utilities, and other bills, such that they could petition DHS to lower the cost of living to match the amount contracted for my doctoral work. The entire ordeal threw me in a panic, and I only received news of the approved rectification the very week of finals. This resulted in me asking for an extension on said finals from my Director of Graduate Studies/Chair of the Graduate Studies Committee (Dr. Janet Lyon), who gave me her verbal approval.

However, under pressure from the rest of the Committee, Dr. Lyon later retracted these extensions and informed me that my funding would be terminated effective May of 2022. Through a protracted battle during which I was consistently denied the ability to exercise my rights under Penn State's own Graduate Student Handbook, my department and I came to the compromise of letting me graduate with a Master's degree. The reason cited for my dismissal was medical, since I had been placed under an involuntary psychiatric hold in the Fall of 2021 based on a wellness check from someone I didn't even know. Ironically, these were the same reasons upon which I had been granted the extension on my finals in the first place, in addition to my disability accommodations.

Importantly, this means that the contract that I signed for doctoral study was never fulfilled by Penn State not only despite the fact that I was about to begin my doctoral work in 2022, but also that it was never fulfilled despite it being signed by both myself and my department. The unusualness of this cannot be overstated, since doctoral programs at "High Research Activity" universities like Penn State are meant to be fully funded through and through.

As U.S. immigration law currently stands, human trafficking laws only extend to people who are on immigrant or work visas. Meanwhile, student visas, like the one I was on, place the ultimate legal responsibility for fiscal guardianship on the individual themselves. This meant that my program was able to exploit this loophole, using me as cheap labor for their Freshman Composition classes while avoiding the legal responsibilities that would come with hiring either a citizen or immigrant.

Since leaving Penn State, I have been busy trying to seek immigration justice for myself and living off of what savings I had and whatever friend and family support I can gather. This amount has unfortunately run out, and I have already had to rely on medical vouchers for my anti-seizure medications. I am skipping meals and my doctors have noticed my undernourishment. I moved to Chicago from New York City last year as a cost-saving measure, and have had to restart the process of finding legal aid since. The process has been difficult as I have had to prioritize my deteriorating health that is a direct result of the stress and trauma that the English department at Penn State put me through. Specifically, I have developed fibromyalgia, which is a nerve- and autoimmune-related disorder, which causes me to be in chronic pain.

My attempts at finding immigration justice through nonprofits have largely been unsuccessful because of a lack of full legal status, and so now I am left with the only option of retaining a lawyer privately.

Thank you for taking the time to read and share; I would greatly appreciate any and all assistance during this very trying time.

All my very best,

Zeke