>
> NJIPN Post.
>
> We're quoted in this important story.
>
> __________
>
> March 27, 2006
> Groundswell of Protests Back Illegal Immigrants
> By NINA BERNSTEIN
>
> When members of the Senate Judiciary Committee meet today to wrestle
> with the fate of more than 11 million illegal immigrants living in the
> United States, they can expect to do so against a backdrop of thousands
> of demonstrators, including clergy members wearing handcuffs and
> immigrant leaders in T-shirts that declare, "We Are America."
>
> But if events of recent days hold true, they will be facing much more
> than that.
>
> Rallies in support of immigrants around the country have attracted
> crowds that have astonished even their organizers. More than a
> half-million demonstrators marched in Los Angeles on Saturday, as many
> as 300,000 in Chicago on March 10, and - in between - tens of
> thousands in Denver, Phoenix, Milwaukee and elsewhere.
>
> One of the most powerful institutions behind the wave of public
> protests has been the Roman Catholic Church, lending organizational
> muscle to a spreading network of grass-roots coalitions. In recent
> weeks, the church has unleashed an army of priests and parishioners to
> push for the legalization of the nation's illegal immigrants, sending
> thousands of postcards to members of Congress and thousands of
> parishioners into the streets.
>
> The demonstrations embody a surging constituency demanding that illegal
> immigrants be given a path to citizenship rather than be punished with
> prison terms. It is being pressed as never before by immigrants who
> were long thought too fearful of deportation to risk so public a
> display.
>
> "It's unbelievable," said Partha Banerjee, director of the New Jersey
> Immigration Policy!
Network, who was in Washington yesterday to help
> plan more nationwide protests on April 10. "People are joining in so
> spontaneously, it's almost like the immigrants have risen. I would call
> it a civil rights movement reborn in this country."
>
> What has galvanized demonstrators, especially Mexicans and other Latin
> Americans who predominate among illegal immigrants, is proposed
> legislation - already passed by the House of Representatives - that
> would make it a felony to be in the United States without proper
> papers, and a federal crime to aid illegal immigrants.
>
> But the proposed measure also shows the clout of another growing force
> that elected officials have to reckon with: a groundswell of anger
> against illegal immigration that is especially potent in border states
> and swing-voting suburbs where the numbers and social costs of illegal
> immigrants are most acutely felt.
>
> "It's an entirely predictable example of the law of unintended
> consequences," said Joshua Hoyt, executive director of the Illinois
> Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, who helped organize the
> Chicago rally and who said he was shocked by the size of the turnout.
> "The Republican party made a decision to use illegal immigration as the
> wedge issue of 2006, and the Mexican community was profoundly
> offended."
>
> Until the wave of immigration rallies, the campaign by groups demanding
> stringent enforcement legislation seemed to have the upper hand in
> Washington. The Judiciary Committee was deluged by faxes and e-mail
> messages from organizations like NumbersUSA, which calls for a
> reduction in immigration, and claims 237,000 activists nationwide, and
> the Federation for American Immigration Reform, which has long opposed
> any form of amnesty, including a guest-worker program advocated by
> Presid!
ent Bush.
>
> Dan Stein, president of the federation, acknowledged the unexpected
> outpouring of protesters, but tried to play down its political
> significance. "These are a lot of people who don't vote, can't vote and
> certainly aren't voting Republican if they do vote," he said.
>
> But others, noting that foreign-born Latinos voted for President Bush
> in 2004 at a 40 percent greater rate than Latinos born in the United
> States, said that by pursuing the proposed legislation, Republican
> leaders might have squandered the party's inroads with an emerging bloc
> of voters and pushed them into the Democratic camp.
>
> The Pew Hispanic Center estimates that of more than 11 million illegal
> immigrants, 78 percent are from Mexico or other Latin American
> countries. Many have children and other relatives who are United States
> citizens. Under the House measure, family members of illegal immigrants
> - as well as clergy members, social workers and lawyers - would
> risk up to five years in prison if they helped an illegal immigrant
> remain in the United States.
>
> "Imagine turning more than 11 million people into criminals, and anyone
> who helps them," said Angela Sanbrano, executive director of the
> Central American Resource Center of Los Angeles, one of the organizers
> of Saturday's rally there. "It's outrageous. We needed to send a strong
> and clear message to Congress and to President Bush that the immigrant
> community will not allow the criminalization of our people - and it
> needed to be very strong because of the anti-immigrant environment that
> we are experiencing in Congress."
>
> Like many advocates for immigrants, Ms. Sanbrano said the protesters
> would prefer that Congress passed no immigration legislation rather
> than criminalizing those who are here without documents or creating a> guest-worker program that would require millions to go home.
>
> In a telephone briefing sponsored last week by the National Immigration
> Forum, the Rev. Samuel Rodriguez Jr., president of the National
> Hispanic Association of Evangelicals, warned that elected officials
> would pay a price for being on the wrong side of the legislative
> battle.
>
> "We are talking to the politicians telling them that the Hispanic
> community will not forget," he said. "I know there are pure hearts that
> want to protect our border and protect our country, but at the same
> time the Hispanic community cannot deny the fact that many have taken
> advantage of an important and legitimate issue in order to manifest
> their racist and discriminatory spirit against the Hispanic community."
>
> Seventy of the nation's 197 Catholic dioceses have formally committed
> to the immigration campaign since the United States Catholic Conference
> of Bishops began the effort last year, and church officials are
> recruiting the rest.
>
> Meanwhile, priests and deacons have been working side by side with
> immigrant communities and local immigrant activist groups.
>
> Leo Anchondo, who directs the immigrant campaign for the bishops'
> conference, said that he was not surprised by the size of the protests
> because immigration advocacy groups had been working hard to build a
> powerful campaign. "We hadn't seen efforts to organize these
> communities before," Mr. Anchondo said. "It's certainly a testament to
> the fact that people are very scared of what seems to be driving this
> anti-immigrant legislation, to the point that they are coming out to
> make sure they speak and are heard."
>
> Last night in downtown Los Angeles, Fabricio Fierros, 18, the
> American-born son of mushroom-pickers who came to the United States
> ille!
gally from Mexico, joined about 5,000 Mexican farmworkers gathered
> for a Mass celebrating the birthday of Cesar Chavez.
>
> "It's not fair to workers here to just kick them out without giving
> them a legal way to be here," Mr. Fierros said, "To be treated as
> criminals after all the work they did isn't fair."
>
> John M. Broder and Rachel L. Swarns contributed reporting for this
> article.
>
> ###
>
>
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