WASHINGTON, D.C. — The National Partnership for New Americans (NPNA) has unveiled the Climate Displaced Leaders story series, a collection of five first-person video testimonies from immigrants and refugees who migrated to the United States due to climate impacts in their home countries. This release comes one week before world leaders convene in Belém, Brazil, for the COP30 United Nations (UN) climate conference, where the role of climate change as a driver of global migration is emerging as an important point of discussion. 

The video series, available at ClimateDisplacedLeaders.org, highlights self-identified climate-displaced individuals leading efforts for immigrant and climate justice within NPNA’s membership of the nation’s largest immigrant and refugee rights organizations. These first-person narratives illustrate the complex intersections between climate change and other migration drivers, such as social persecution, violent conflict, and governmental instability.

Said Ahmed Gaya, Climate Justice Collaborative director, NPNA: “Ahead of COP30, we are building a first-of-its-kind, multi-racial, multilingual cohort of climate-displaced leaders in the United States. Our goal is to deepen the global understanding of climate migration and champion solutions from those closest to the climate crisis. These leaders, in their own voices, are moving beyond oversimplified narratives to tell their own stories and design their own solutions. Despite the trauma of displacement, they are now planting seeds of resilience in communities across the United States.

“At this year’s UN climate conference, communities impacted by climate displacement will be delivering a clear message: just climate solutions must protect the rights and dignity of climate-displaced people.”

Upon request, leaders profiled in the series and the members of NPNA’s delegation of U.S. immigrant and refugee advocates attending COP30 are available for interview.

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The National Partnership for New Americans (NPNA) is a multi-ethnic, multiracial coalition of 88 of the nation’s largest immigrant and refugee rights organizations with reach across over 42 states. Together with our members, we advance immigrant and refugee equity and inclusion, build and expand immigration legal services and integration programming capacity, and drive campaigns that strengthen democracy through increased civic participation. See our website for more information at partnershipfornewamericans.org. To learn more about the Climate Justice Collaborative, visit here.