Jay Campos
M.A. Student
LALS
Email:
About
Jay is a first-year M.A. student in Latin American and Latino Studies at the University of Illinois Chicago with a research focus on the political economy of Latine life in the United States. His work seeks to re-center class analysis within Latine Studies, drawing from Marxist and structural power traditions to examine how racial capitalism exploits Latine labor, restricts mobility, and consolidates control through mechanisms like the immigration/deportation system, economic restructuring, and the current finance economy.
As a research associate at the Great Cities Institute, some of the major projects that Jay has worked/working on deal with racial disparities in youth joblessness, the 2025 Budget Engagement Report for Chicago, the city's deliberate use of Tax Increment Financing (TIF) as a neoliberal tool, and the 2024 Fuerza Mexicana Report. Jay’s work blends quantitative analysis, geospatial mapping, and archival/community-grounded research design to make structural conditions visible and actionable.
In addition to research, Jay helped co-found the Latine Student Coalition and Latine in Law at UIC, where they’ve participated in the organized campaigns of other student organizations to demand support for our Palestinian students, demand more Black and Brown faculty, pushed for greater resource transparency and access for Latine students, and hosted/participated in educational workshops on the history and current status of the Latine community both outside, and within the US. Jay is committed to producing research and concrete analyses to bolster class consciousness into mainstream discourse and further the advancement of collective liberation.