Gilberto Cardenas is director of the Institute for Latino Studies, which includes the Center for the Study of Latino Religions at the University of Notre Dame in Notre Dame, Ind.

Joachim von Braun is director general of the International Food Policy Research Institute, whose mission is to seek sustainable solutions to end hunger and poverty. Based in Washington, D.C., it is one of 15 centers supported by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research, an alliance of 64 governments, private foundations, and international and regional organizations.

James Vernon is a history professor at the University of California-Berkeley and author of Hunger: A Modern History. He teaches courses on food and hunger.

The Rev. Alexia Salvatierra is a minister in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and executive director of Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice-California. She has been active in the New Sanctuary Movement and can discuss its organization on the national and local level.

Daniel Okada is an assistant professor of criminal justice at California State University Sacramento. He is co-chair of the Justice Studies Association’s 2009 conference, which focused partly on the New Sanctuary Movement and other contributions of religious congregations to the plight of illegal aliens.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Washington, D.C., enforces U.S. immigration law.

Nancy Morawetz is a professor of clinical law at New York University. She is an expert on immigration and teaches courses on immigrant rights clinics. She can discuss the U.S. system of detention and deportation.

Doris Meissner is a senior fellow at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington. She was formerly a commissioner at the Immigration and Naturalization Service, which oversaw immigration before the establishment of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency in 2003.

Margie McHugh is co-director of the National Center on Immigrant Integration Policy at the Migration Policy Institute in Washington, D.C.