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Millions expected in immigration protests { April 10 2006 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/politics/la-na-immig10apr10,1,1722635.story?coll=la-news-politics-nationalhttp://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/politics/la-na-immig10apr10,1,1722635.story?coll=la-news-politics-national
Immigration Activists on March Again
Organizers expect about 2 million demonstrators across the nation today in an effort they call unprecedented. The goal is to influence Congress.
By Greg Miller
Times Staff Writer
April 10, 2006
WASHINGTON — Hundreds of thousands of immigrant rights activists are expected to participate today in a coordinated campaign of nationwide protest that organizers say will be the largest of its kind in the nation's history.
As many as 200,000 protesters are expected on the National Mall in Washington as part of a rally that acquired new urgency among immigrant rights groups after a compromise bill to overhaul immigration laws collapsed amid partisan rancor in the Senate last week.
The protest in the nation's capital is one of more than 140 planned in dozens of cities. Organizers said the anticipated turnout in Washington could be matched in New York and Los Angeles.
"It is the largest national mobilization of immigrants in the history of this country," said Juan Carlos Ruiz, coordinator of the National Capital Immigrant Coalition, the umbrella group organizing the event in Washington. "The goal is to show Congress and the media and the White House that we can organize ourselves, because we have not been very well organized in the past."
Organizers expect the turnout nationally to approach 2 million, Ruiz said.
From Chico to San Diego, 21 demonstrations are planned in California. In Southern California, they include a rally at the federal building in Santa Ana at noon and candlelight vigils in the San Fernando Valley and downtown Los Angeles.
Los Angeles emerged as the epicenter of the resurgent immigrant rights movement last month when 500,000 marchers, by police estimate, flooded streets around City Hall in opposition to legislation, passed by the House late last year, that would crack down on the estimated 11 million to 12 million people in the United States illegally.
Organizers said they did not expect a turnout of that magnitude today.
The protests, dubbed the National Day of Action for Immigrant Justice, are backed by an array of immigrant rights groups — Latino advocacy organizations, labor unions and religious institutions, including the Roman Catholic Church.
Rallies Sunday included a peaceful march in downtown Dallas, where police estimated the crowd at 350,000 to 500,000. In San Diego, about 50,000 demonstrators gathered at Balboa Park and marched through the streets to a county administration building, police said; no arrests were reported.
Other demonstrations were held in Fort Worth; Miami; St. Paul, Minn.; Birmingham, Ala.; Des Moines; St. Louis; Salem, Ore.; and Boise, Idaho.
The demonstrations are taking place as members of Congress return home for a two-week recess. Prospects for legislation are unclear.
A deal on a compromise bill favored by many immigrant rights groups unraveled late last week, but several lawmakers said Sunday that the flurry of protests would probably pressure Congress to reconsider the bill this month.
Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) — chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which has jurisdiction over immigration legislation — said he expected another compromise bill to emerge.
"I think tempers will cool over a two-week period," he told "Fox News Sunday." "And also, there are going to be some expressions by many people very unhappy with the Senate not passing a bill and very unhappy with the House bill.
"There's a real risk of significant political fallout here."
But other lawmakers questioned whether the protests would have such political force, with some suggesting that the sight of demonstrators waving the flags of Mexico and other countries might alienate voters and undermine the immigrant rights cause.
Rep. Peter T. King (R-N.Y.), chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said he believed that senators had succumbed to such pressure, but that Republicans in the House remained opposed to any legislation that would grant illegal immigrants an opportunity for citizenship.
"The Senate, I think, was, quite frankly, intimidated by having hundreds of thousands of people in the streets waving flags," King said on "Fox News Sunday." "You can't allow that to intimidate you."
Rep. Henry Bonilla (R-Texas) said on NBC's "Meet the Press": "When you come here and wave a Mexican flag in our face in a country that's giving a lot of these people an opportunity that they've never had before, I think a lot of Americans are insulted."
Mindful of such concerns, organizers of today's rallies said they were taking steps to avoid antagonizing potential supporters.
In Washington, Ruiz said, "you're going to see a sea of people wearing white shirts and white blouses and carrying the American flag, honoring this country because this is the country we want to belong to.
"That doesn't mean we are renouncing the love we have for our countries," he added. "All that shows is that we want to be here, we are committed and pledge to the values and the symbols of this country, and the flag is one of them."
Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), a member of a bipartisan group of lawmakers that helped broker a brief accord on the Senate bill, is among those scheduled to speak at the Washington rally.
The wave of protests was launched largely in response to strict legislation that passed the House in December. That measure would make it a felony to be in the U.S. illegally, and it calls for construction of a 700-mile-long fence along the Mexican border and stiff new fines for employers who hire illegal immigrants.
The Senate bill that became snagged last week includes not only border-security elements but provisions that would put millions of illegal immigrants on a path to citizenship if they pay fines and meet certain other conditions.
The compromise bill would create a tiered system in which illegal immigrants in the country five years or more could work toward citizenship without leaving the United States.
Those in the country two to five years would be required to return briefly to their home countries and reenter the United States under temporary work visas; they too could eventually be eligible for citizenship. People in the United States illegally for less than two years would be sent to their native countries.
Even if the Senate were to find a way past its partisan impasse on the issue, House Republicans said Sunday that they remained opposed to the thrust of the Senate bill.
"I'm for securing the borders and enforcing the laws," House Majority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) told ABC's "This Week." "Until we do that, if you try to create a guest-worker program, all you're doing is inviting more illegal immigration."
A guest-worker program "sounds too much like amnesty to most Americans," Boehner said.
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Times staff writer Nicole Gaouette contributed to this report.
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