Carmen Perez

Carmen Perez is the co-chair of the 2017 Women’s March on Washington, co-founder of the Justice League, and the Executive Director of The Gathering for Justice, a social justice organization founded by Harry Belafonte that utilizes Kingian nonviolence as a social application for change and civic engagement. As Executive Director of The Gathering, Carmen has crossed the globe promoting peace, interconnectedness, and alternatives to incarceration and violence. In 2011, she help develop Purple Gold, a young worker’ s program that engages and cultivates the membership of 1199SEIU’s 35-and-under members, while setting the future for the Labor Movement.  She has been the founder of the youth leadership group R.E.A.L. (Reforming Education, Advocating for Leadership) and Co-Founder of The Girls Task Force, which is dedicated to improving gender-specific services to better support all girls in our communities, and an organizer with Barrios Unidos in Santa Cruz – an organization dedicated to providing non-violence training and re-entry services for the incarcerated. She’s the recipient of countless awards for her activism, including the United Way’s “Community Hero Award,” Santa Cruz County Women’s Commission “Trailblazer’s Award in Criminal Justice,” and a Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition for Outstanding and Invaluable Service to the Community.