Immigrants to strike, boycott, march

Last year’s massive immigrant worker protests stopped the repressive Sensenbrenner Bill. This year the situation for immigrant workers is still precarious, and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) department has stepped up its roundups of immigrant workers, often tearing families apart and leaving children without care.

Faced with this situation, the movement of immigrant workers has planned another day of protest on May Day. Javier Rodriguez is the media and political strategist for the March 25 Coalition responsible for last year’s massive demonstrations first in Los Angeles and then in other parts of the country and a co-founder of this year’s May 1st National Movement.

In an April 19 interview on Democracy Now! Rodriguez expressed optimism about the group’s expectations this year: “We have 63 organizations that have convened the second national boycott for May 1: Great American Boycott II,” he says. “We have at this time approximately 16 states on the list with about 75 cities, all the major cities in the country, from Los Angeles all the way to New York.”

Meanwhile Democratic Congress members have proposed new legislation known as the STRIVE Act or the Gutierrez-Flake Bill. While this proposal doesn’t contain all the repressive elements that the Sensenbrenner Bill did, it falls far short of what most immigrants are willing to settle for. Rodriguez called the STRIVE Act “corporate-designed immigration reform.”

“We defeated Sensenbrenner and the Hagel-Martinez bill,” he continues. “And a new version of immigration reform has come to the fore. ... The difference now, in terms of us, we’re a lot better organized. We have been able to pretty much consolidate the mass movement.”

For May 1, said Rodriguez, “we expect a large turnout, not just on the streets in over 75 cities, but also the boycott. ... Last year, just in Los Angeles alone, we almost closed the whole city down. We had over four million people participating.”

Rodriguez explained that the group has also organized in Mexico, where more than 1,000 organizations are participating. “And we are closing several of the ports of entry from Mexico to the United States. Last year, just from Juarez and El Paso from Juarez, over 40,000 workers refused to enter to work to El Paso on May 1. This time around, it will be Brownsville, Reynosa/McAllen border, and also Juarez again.” Venezuela will also be participating, he said.

On the West Coast of the U.S. the International Longshore Workers Union has passed a resolution to close down the ports on May 1. “The trucking industry, those that pull the cargo, also are with us. ... United Teachers of Los Angeles are with us, [as well as] the major coalitions in the country that closed down the cities last year in San Antonio, the Border Social Forum; in New York, the May 1 Coalition; and others.”