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Immigrant youth declare: ’Undocumented, unafraid’
By
Dianne Mathiowetz
Atlanta
Published Apr 14, 2011 11:07 PM
Atlanta 7 members from left: Jose Rico Benavides, Maria Marroquin, Dayanna Rebolledo, Andrea Rosales, Georgina Perez, David Ramírez, Viridiana Berenice Martinez.
Photo: Kung Li
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Hundreds of students from nearby Georgia State University, area high school
youth, civil rights leaders and community members gathered in Hurt Park April 5
in Atlanta and listened attentively to the stories of eight young people from
Georgia, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Illinois who proclaimed
that they were coming out of the shadows to openly fight for their rights as
human beings. All of them have grown up in the U.S., brought by their parents
— seeking relief from conditions of extreme poverty in their home
countries and a better life for their children — who have worked for
years in this country.
The students wept as they described the fear that they or their parents would
be deported — a fear that constantly rules their lives. They spoke about
how well they did in school and their dreams of making a contribution to their
community as a lawyer, a teacher, a social worker.
The youths talked about all their efforts to win passage of the DREAM Act,
which failed to pass in Congress last year. That legislation would have offered
tens of thousands of undocumented youth a path to citizenship. They all
declared that they were not going to be silent as elected officials use them as
political pawns to curry favor with right-wing forces. Before the TV cameras
and police agencies, to the roar of approval from their supporters, they
declared they were “undocumented and unafraid.” One of the goals of
the action was to call upon the president of Georgia State University, Mark
Becker, to refuse to comply with a Board of Regents’ ban on admitting
qualified undocumented youth to study at the institution. Earlier this year,
the governing body of Georgia’s public universities, colleges and
technical schools capitulated to anti-immigrant pressure and barred
undocumented students from the state’s top five public institutions of
higher education, including GSU.
These students already have to pay out-of-state tuition, which is almost triple
that paid by fellow high school graduates. They are also not eligible for the
HOPE scholarship program. Georgia also denies a driver’s license to
anyone who does not have papers. Just days before this action, upwards of 8,000
people packed the street in front of the Georgia Capitol to oppose an Arizona
SB 1070-style racial profiling law that is pending final passage in the
Assembly. Pressure against the anti-immigrant legislation has come from diverse
forces, including business interests, religious groups, civil rights
organizations and foreign trade leaders, warning that Georgia will become the
target of a boycott.
Sit-in demands ‘education, not
deportation’
After delivering a letter to Becker’s office, the protesters marched
around the campus, chanting “Education, not deportation” and
“Refuse the ban.” In a synchronized action, they placed huge
banners, reading “We will no longer remain in the shadows” and
“Will you take a stand?” in the middle of a highly trafficked
street, leading to the State Capitol, and sat down. Cars came to a halt; the
area was filled with chanting students, TV cameras, photographers and
eventually police.
After more than an hour and a great deal of discussion among the several police
forces, including campus and Capitol agencies, members of the Atlanta Police
Department arrested seven young people to the boos and cries of
“shame” from the crowd. Each of these seven youth face the
possibility of being deported as a result of their arrest. Held in the Atlanta
City Jail overnight on charges of obstructing traffic, they were all questioned
by Immigration and Customs Enforcement about their citizenship but were not
turned over to the federal agents. On the morning of April 6, they all were
released on $2,000 bonds. Taking a page from the student actions of the 1960s
Civil Rights Movement, there are plans to commit similar acts of civil
disobedience in other cities to focus attention on the injustice of immigration
policies that criminalize workers, deny young people opportunity, separate
families and promote racial profiling. For more information, go to www.thedreamiscoming.com.
Articles copyright 1995-2012 Workers World.
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