Response to attack on immigrant rights
Calif. boycott sends message of resistance
By Adrian Garcia
Los Angeles
Despite reprisals at the hands of the bosses,
thousands of immigrants, workers and students in Southern
California stayed away from work, stores and schools on Dec.
12. The boycott was organized by immigrants' rights groups
after Arnold Schwarzenegger was elected governor of California
in October and announced he would lead the repeal of Senate
Bill 60.
This law would have allowed undocumented workers to obtain a
driver's license. It was supposed to go into effect on Jan. 1,
2004. The repeal occurred on Dec. 1 with the collaboration of
Democrats in the State Assembly who had previously championed
its cause.
The boycott also prompted Latino-owned small businesses and
businesses with a largely immigrant work force and clientele to
close shop for the day.
"At the very least, we have provoked a debate at work
places, commercial establishments, in school districts, and at
the political level," Nativo Lopez, president of the Mexican
American Political Association, told the newspaper La Opinion.
The boycott was a signal to bosses in the state and the country
that immigrant workers are a vital component of the work force
and will no longer sit idly while reactionary attacks on their
livelihood are ruthlessly perpetrated.
Although it is difficult to quantify exactly how many people
participated in the statewide economic boycott, Noe Hernandez,
coordinator for the Communitarian Union Project, estimated that
some 200,000 people abstained from going to work in Fresno,
Calif., alone. Farm workers refused to cut trees or perform
many gardening chores, despite bosses' threats to their jobs.
(La Opinion, Dec.13)
Schools throughout California's predominantly immigrant
communities were faced with unprecedented rates of absenteeism
by both students and teachers. Parents kept their children home
as a sign of solidarity with immigrant workers and their
families. Some schools reported an absentee rate as high as
three-quarters.
Unexcused absences cost the state $40 per student. The Los
Angeles Unified School District sent a memo to teachers and
parents in an attempt to dissuade teacher and student
participation in the boycott.
"What is being done to us immigrants is unjust and I will do
my part by keeping my child from going to school," remarked a
woman whose three children attend an elementary school in East
Los Angeles.
The economic boycott is just the beginning of resistance by
California workers against a reactionary agenda that targets
the undocumented. Immigrants' rights groups are positioning
themselves for a struggle that is gaining momentum. Latino
Movement USA has scheduled major demonstrations in February,
March and October of next year.
The success of the economic boycott indicates that workers
in general are recognizing that immigrant workers' struggle
against capitalist divide-and-conquer tactics is their
struggle.
Reprinted from the Dec. 25, 2003, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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