Meet Our New Co-Executive Director: Lizeth Chacón

Dear Workers Defense family, 

After a nationwide search, the Board of Workers Defense is excited to announce that Lizeth Chacón will become our next Co-Executive Director, joining current Co-Executive Director and Co-Founder Emily Timm in leadership.

In our search for a leader to steward our family of organizations, we centered our members’ collective vision of fighting for and achieving workplace justice. Lizeth brings over 16 years of organizing and power-building experience in Colorado for communities of color, immigrants and working families. As an immigrant from Chihuahua, Mexico who came to the United States at the age of 12, her lived-experience of the injustices immigrants face both informs her passion to fight for systemic change and her leadership style in fighting for and with our communities.

Most recently, she has served as the Founding Executive Director of Colorado People’s Alliance (COPA), a member-led, racial justice, multi-issue organization that has won unprecedented victories for working families and immigrants in Colorado. For example, in 2016, Lizeth co-chaired the statewide ballot measure that successfully increased Colorado’s minimum wage to $12 an hour by 2020 and she co-created the Statewide Immigrant Resistance Table. She also co-founded and serves on the Governing Council for the Transformative Leadership for Change, which nurtures the sustainability, solidarity and radical visions of BIPOC movement leaders in Colorado. 

We are so thrilled to have Lizeth join Emily as Co-Executive Director to lead us into our next chapter. Our Co-Executive Director model reflects our values of shared leadership and we know Lizeth and Emily will be a powerhouse duo. 

Workers Defense celebrates its 20 Year Anniversary this year and we believe the future couldn’t be brighter for our organization. With Lizeth and Emily at the helm of Workers Defense Project and Workers Defense Action Fund, we will continue to fight for—and win—workplace justice and immigrants’ rights by building power for those building our state. The next chapter of our work will require us to take on challenging economic and social conditions for immigrant workers, growing climate crises, and deepening corporate power in Texas, but we know this powerful leadership team is ready to take on the challenge. 

In solidarity,