Vol. 71/No. 33      September 10, 2007

To counter bosses’ efforts to use the raids to intimidate and divide workers, the labor movement must unequivocally oppose all raids, deportations, and other anti-immigrant attacks. Working people need to organize unions and use union power in defense of the undocumented to effectively fight the employers’ assault on the job conditions, living standards, and rights of all workers.

These anti-working-class attacks range from factory raids like the December 12 and July 10 police sweeps at Swift meatpacking plants, to ordinances in numerous towns that seek to criminalize undocumented workers by barring them from local employment, housing, or services. Also arrayed against working people are rightist groups like the Minutemen and the fascist-minded American Socialist Movement, which have been targeting foreign-born workers in the Midwest and elsewhere.

Many workers have not been intimidated, however. Their mood has been captured in the slogan “We are workers, not criminals!” Day laborers in Virginia and other areas have rallied and held conferences to demand the right to seek work without cop harassment. Protests took place in several cities after la migra recently arrested and deported Elvira Arellano, a former Chicago airport worker who, taking refuge in a church over the past year, became an outspoken symbol of resistance by immigrant workers.

These struggles are a sign of immigrant workers gaining self-confidence as they become more integrated into the U.S. working class by the millions. As that process unfolds it strengthens the working class as a whole.

An indicator of these changes is the widespread solidarity among working people today with six coal miners trapped in a Utah mine collapse, which include both Mexican- and U.S.-born miners. Immigrant workers are part of the discussions today among miners in that region on how to fight unsafe job conditions and on the need to organize unions.

The ruling U.S. capitalists remain divided over immigration policy, as seen in their failure to pass an “immigration reform” law. All existing proposals by Democrats and Republicans are reactionary measures serving the bosses and should be rejected.

Building the upcoming immigrant rights actions in September and October provides an opportunity to involve more working people in the battle for full, unconditional legal status for all immigrants and an immediate halt to all deportations and migra raids.
 
 
Related articles:
L.A. march: ‘No to raids, deportations!’
Day laborers in Virginia fight for right to seek work
At Nebraska meeting, meat packers denounce raids
Stop the raids and deportations!  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home