Our Team

Fernando has been the Associate  Director for the IRR since August 2023. Prior to joining IRR Fernando was the Executive Director of Pomona Economic Opp Center since January 2015. He has an extensive background and experience in community organizing on immigrant rights and workers rights. Fernando lived in the United States as an undocumented immigrant for 21 years since the age of 8. As of August 2015, he is accredited by the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) to conduct document preparation and at low-cost for immigration benefits  He was the Director for the Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice from 2011 to 2015 where some of the most prominent work was that of the crisis of the Migrant Children and Families in Murrieta, CA during July 2014. As an undocumented student at California State University, Long Beach (CSULB), he studied creative writing and journalism and was a co-founder of FUEL, the first AB 540 support group at CSULB, co-founder of the independent, on-campus publication focused on Latina/Latino students El Reflejo and the video blog project for undocumented youth Dreamers Adrift.