Los Angeles protest confronts anti-immigrant racists
By
Jim McMahan
Los Angeles
Published Jun 5, 2005 11:00 PM
On May 25, some 400 people
demonstrated against the racist anti-immigrant Minuteman Project organization in
Garden Grove, near Los Angeles. The Minute man Project’s founder, James
(“I’m damned proud to be a vigilante”) Gilchrist of Orange
County, was the featured speaker and honoree at a club banquet.
Also at
the banquet were other racists such as Barbara Coe, chairwoman of the Coalition
for Immigration Reform. Coe was the leader of the racist Proposition 187
campaign, which sought to deny all social and economic rights to undocumented
workers.
The Minutemen have recently formed a much ballyhooed project,
sending armed racists to the United States/Mexico border to terrorize Mexicans
seeking work in the United States.
The anti-racist demonstration
surrounded the club where a hundred or so KKK-racists had gathered. The racists
were defended by over 100 cops with tear-gas canisters and shotguns, and 20 cops
on horseback.
Not intimidated, the fierce demonstrators were loud. They
bombarded the Minutemen for over three hours with chants and denunciations such
as: “Immi grants yes, save our state! We don’t want your racist
hate!”
The demonstration remained strong although there were arrests
and casualties. Two demonstrators were run over by a racist as he drove into the
lot. They were taken to the hospital and the racist, Hal Netkin, was arrested,
but then released after the demonstration.
Eight demonstrators, including
a man in a wheelchair, were arrested on trumped- up felony
charges.
Organizers and participants at the demonstration included the
Alianza Indigenes, which vows to continue the struggle. Other groups there in
support were the Centro Cultural Mexicano, Inter national Socialist
Organization, Carecen, and International Action Center.
Articles copyright 1995-2012 Workers World.
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