Angelica Salas

Angelica Salas is the Director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (CHIRLA). Since becoming CHIRLA’s Director in 1999, Salas has spearheaded several ambitious campaigns. Among her accomplishments, Salas helped win in-state tuition for undocumented immigrant students and established day laborer job centers that have served as a model for the entire country. She led the effort to allow all California drivers to obtain licenses and is a leading spokesperson on federal immigration policy. In January 2021, Salas was elected to serve as Cal Wellness' board secretary.

Under Salas’ leadership, CHIRLA and its partners across the country have built the foundation for the recent upsurge in immigrant rights activism. As part of a national coordinating committee, Salas helped convene a coalition of organizations in Southern California that have successfully mobilized millions of immigrants to demand comprehensive immigration reform including legalization with a path to citizenship, family reunification, and the protection of civil and labor rights.

One of Salas’s greatest accomplishments at CHIRLA has been the transformation of a coalition of social service providers into an organization that empowers immigrants to engage in advocacy on their own behalf. In this respect, she has blazed a pioneering trail among immigrant coalitions around the country and has propelled other immigrant rights groups to follow her lead. In March she walked along thousands in the annual Selma to Montgomery March.

She comes by her understanding of the immigrant experience firsthand. As a five year old, Salas came to the U.S. from Mexico to rejoin her parents who had come to the U.S. to find work and better provide for their family.