Last Friday, comedian Stephen Colbert appeared in court as an “expert witness” to speak on behalf of America’s farmworkers.  Colbert, who hosts Comedy Central’s The Colbert Report in character as a conservative news anchor, was asked by California representative Zoe Lofgren to testify after he worked for one day as a farm worker at Gill Corn Farms in Hurley, New York.  The stint was on an episode of his show as a part of the United Farm Workers’ “Take Our Jobs” challenge.

Colbert appeared in court in character describing what he called his “vast experience spending one day as a migrant farm worker”.  Sarcastically Colbert joked, “I certainly hope that my star power can bump this hearing all the way up to C-SPAN 1″.  The comedian did break from character a few times to persuade the House pannel to support the AgJOBS bill which would increased the number of legal farmworkers in the country.  He stated, “It seems like some of the least powerful people in the United States are migrant workers who come and do our work, but don’t have any rights as a result.  And yet we still invite them to come here and at the same time ask them to leave.  And that’s an interesting contradiction to me”.

If you or someone you know needs to obtain labor certification, contact the Orange County labor certification attorneys of Garg & Associates P.C. at 949-540-6704 to learn more about your rights.