Vol. 77/No. 12      April 1, 2013

The Fair Immigration Reform Movement, one of the endorsers of the protests, kicked off regional bus caravans around the country in February and March in 19 states.

The actions are in response to so-called immigration reform legislation proposals being debated in Congress.

“There are many different versions and ideas about immigration reform,” Felipe Benítez, spokesperson for the Alliance for Citizenship, said in a phone interview. “We want to see a clear, feasible and relatively fast path to citizenship. We don’t want to see the creation of second-class citizens.”

There are two similar proposals being discussed in Congress. One promoted by the “gang of eight”—four Democratic and four Republican senators—and the other by President Barack Obama. Both proposals would grant at best a probationary status to undocumented immigrants who pass a background check, pay unspecified fines and back taxes, and can prove they are currently working.

Obama’s proposal specifies a period of up to eight years before those with probationary permits could apply for permanent status—what Obama often calls “going to the back of the line.”

In the Feb. 19 El Diario, a daily paper in New York, columnist Elvira Arellano addressed many of the concerns of undocumented workers. “We can’t accept a law that excludes people with misdemeanors (like driving without a license) on their records or who don’t have full-time jobs,” she wrote. “Those who were detained at the border the first time they tried to cross should not be excluded from legalization. Those who were deported and separated from their families should be allowed to return.” Arellano, a former airline cleaner, was deported to Mexico in 2007 following a widely publicized fight in Chicago to stay in the U.S. with her son.

Different than amnesty of 1986

The 1986 amnesty was offered when the U.S. economy was expanding and the official unemployment rate declining. The number of undocumented workers entering the U.S. was increasing to meet bosses’ rising demand for lower-cost labor.

Immigrant workers, especially from Latin America, began changing the face of the labor movement. In the mid-1990s, recognizing that immigrant and undocumented workers were a growing part of their dues base, high-ranking union officials shifted positions on immigration. By 2000 the AFL-CIO Executive Council called for citizenship for the undocumented.

In 2006 immigrant workers took to the streets to protest the House-approved Sensenbrenner bill, which would brand all undocumented workers as felons. The high point took place May 1 when some 2 million immigrants across the country joined demonstrations. Many took off work, giving the action the character of a nationwide political strike. The bill was defeated in the streets, boosting immigrant workers’ self-confidence and winning respect and sympathy for their just cause among U.S.-born workers. May Day protests have continued since, though with smaller proportions of workers.

Since then workers in the U.S., like much of the world, have borne the brunt of a contraction in capitalist production and employment.

Two major factors have brought a sharp decline in the number of immigrant workers attempting to enter the United States. First is sustained high unemployment, particularly in construction and other industries with a high proportion of immigrant workers. The second is an immigration policy course that began under the George W. Bush administration and has accelerated under Obama. This includes a real tightening of the U.S.-Mexico border and expansion of laws, programs and databases that make it increasingly difficult for those without papers to get jobs.

According to a study by the Pew Hispanic Center, in 2011, for the first time in four decades, the net migration flow from Mexico to the U.S. was reversed. The estimated number of undocumented workers has dropped to 11.1 million from a peak of 12 million in 2007.

Meanwhile, the percentages of U.S. citizens and voters who are Latino have increased by more than 50 percent since 2000. Politicians from both capitalist parties see Latino voters as a key component in their ability to win elections, adding pressure to give lip service and limited reforms.

Debate over ‘guest workers’

“Guest workers is a nonstarter. We don’t want to create a permanent set of second-class citizens,” Jaime Contreras, a vice president of Service Employees International Union Local 32BJ in Washington, D.C., told the Militant March 5. “We know this issue has pitted one group of workers against another.”

At the same time, Contreras noted that the AFL-CIO, SEIU, together with the Chamber of Commerce, “are still talking about the guest worker question, which is obviously a very complicated issue for the unions.” Aside from some differences on the guest worker issue, he said, unions officials and the Chamber “are talking the same language.”

“Neither deportation nor self-deportation of the large undocumented population is realistic,” the Chamber of Commerce says in a statement on its website. “Under specified and strict conditions, including payment of a fine,” some undocumented should be given “permanent legal status,” it said. The bosses’ association complains that current guest worker programs “are very limited and difficult to use” and that the government must “recognize the necessity of establishing provisional visas for lesser skilled workers.” The Chamber also says it now supports “expanding the use of E-Verify.”

United We Dream, which says it is the largest group of undocumented youth in the country, is not currently involved in building the April 10 protests. “Our strategy is to change the narrative and highlight the stories of hardworking people directly to the legislators,” Celso Mireles, the group’s online strategy coordinator, said in a phone interview from Washington, D.C.

For more information on the April 10 protest, visit www.citizenship-now.org

Related article:
Chicago rally demands immigrant rights, no deportations 
 
 
 
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