Katherine Passley is co-executive director of Beyond the Bars and a recipient of In These Times’ 2025 Labor Organizer of the Year Award. Passley, who was born and raised in North Miami, joined Beyond the Bars as a founding member in 2020 after her father’s incarceration.
Passley has a bachelor’s in pre-law from Florida Memorial University and a master’s degree in criminal justice from Florida International University (where she’s now in a Ph.D. program in legal psychology). She is a poet, chaplain and restorative justice practitioner.
LaborViewpointLabor Organizer of the Year
From Permanent Precarity to Permanent Power
At Beyond the Bars, we see what others refuse to see: the talent, discipline and vision of the criminalized working class.
Katherine Passley