MISSION
VISION
Centro de Trabajadores Unidos: United Workers’ Center is a member-led, grassroots organization on Chicago’s Southeast Side and south suburbs. CTU organizes immigrant and low-wage workers to build collective power, defend their rights, and challenge exploitation. We cultivate worker leadership to confront systemic injustice and transform workplaces, neighborhoods, and local economies from the ground up.
We believe that when workers are empowered and workplaces are just, entire communities thrive. Our vision is a local economy free from exploitation, oppression, and corporate control—where immigrant and low-wage workers have the power to defend their rights, reclaim their dignity, and receive fair compensation for their labor. We fight for a world where workplaces and communities are organized for the people, not profit, and where collective power drives lasting justice and prosperity for all.
HISTORY
Centro de Trabajadores Unidos was born from struggle. In 2008, immigrant workers facing wage theft and abuse at a local factory organized to defend themselves—and won. Refusing to let that fight end there, they built a lasting base where low-wage workers could come together, learn their rights, and take collective action to challenge exploitation. From the start, CTU has been more than a service organization—it is a platform for worker power, where leadership grows from the ground up and communities confront the systems that keep them marginalized.
That spirit of resistance drives CTU today. We organize immigrant, Black, and Latino workers across Chicago’s Southeast Side and south suburbs to fight low wages, unsafe conditions, and unjust immigration systems. Through campaigns, leadership development, and worker-led cooperatives, we help communities build the power to change the rules that govern their workplaces and neighborhoods.
CTU’s work is rooted in solidarity and self-determination. We fight not just for immediate wins, but for long-term transformation—reclaiming resources, creating new models of care and ownership, and ensuring that working people, not corporations or politicians, define what justice looks like. Together, we are building the tools, leadership, and collective power to create a just economy and a thriving community for all.