[Peace] May 1st event Fwd: March together for Immigrant and Worker Rights!

[Karen Medina]

Saturday, May 1st, 11 AM

Champaign County Courthouse

Downtown Urbana (101 E. Main St.)



March together for Immigration Reform!

March together for Workers Rights!

March together to STOP Racial Profiling!



While Arizona passes xenophobic and racist immigration laws, persons of
color in Urbana-Champaign are being mistreated by our law-enforcement
officials, and workers everywhere are subjected to mistreatment and the
constant anxiety of precarious employment.

Celebrate May Day!

Stand for Workers Rights!

Equal Rights for All Under the Law!



For More information please contact the I-DREAM Coalition
idreamillinois at gmail.com or call (773-507-4809)
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
http://socialistworker.org/2010/04/26/anger-builds-over-arizona-law

Analysis: Angela Stoutenburgh

Anger builds over Arizona law

Angela Stoutenburgh reports from Arizona on the impact of a sweeping new
anti-immigrant law--and the response it provoked from opponents who believe
that "no human being is illegal."

April 26, 2010

[image: Protesters march against SB 1070 outside the Arizona Capitol
Building in Phoenix (Art Foxall | UPI)]

Protesters march against SB 1070 outside the Arizona Capitol Building in
Phoenix (Art Foxall | UPI)

WITHIN HOURS of Arizona's racist immigration bill being signed into law on
April 23, thousands of people across the state began taking to the streets
against SB 1070--the strictest immigration law in the country.

Phoenix, the state's capitol, saw several demonstrations over April 23-25,
as hundreds--and in some cases, several thousands--of immigrant rights
defenders turned out against the new law. As many as 2,000 students walked
out of several Phoenix high schools in protest. Other demonstrations
occurred in cities across the state, and furious immigrant rights supporters
around the U.S. met and organized a response to this latest assault.

Ramon Garcia, an activist who traveled to Phoenix from Tucson to take part
in a rally of several thousand on April 24, told Reuters, "I feel very
strongly that the law is extremely unconstitutional and racist, and it
violates both human and civil rights."

Another 3,500 protesters turned out the following day in Phoenix. Wearing
T-shirts that read "Legalize Arizona" and carrying signs saying "We are
human" and "We have rights," protesters called for the Obama administration
to block the law by passing federal immigration reform, and for activists to
carry out civil disobedience, if necessary, to oppose the unjust law.

As Dr. Warren Stewart, pastor of the First Institutional Baptist Church,
told the crowd, "Some of us may have to go to jail if all else fails. Let's
fill up and overflow [anti-immigrant Maricopa County] Sheriff Arpaio's jail.
Overflow it with those for righteousness and for justice."

Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon told the crowd: "We'll go to court. We'll go to
the state courts, we'll go to the federal courts, and we'll go all the way
to the Supreme Court. The law is unconstitutional, the law makes it unsafe
for everyone and the law will harm us economically. Most importantly, it is
just plain wrong."

SB 1070 was signed on April 23 by Gov. Jan Brewer. Brewer claims the law is
a necessity because of a supposed "crisis" of undocumented immigration that,
she says, "the federal government has refused to fix."

The law makes it a crime for immigrants to fail to carry identification
papers. It also "requires a reasonable attempt to be made to determine the
immigration status of a person during any legitimate contact made by an
official or agency of the state or a county, city, town or political
subdivision...if reasonable suspicion exists that the person is an alien who
is unlawfully present in the U.S.," according to a state government fact
sheet.

In other words, Arizona police are now required to check the immigration
status of anyone "suspected" of possibly being undocumented (although the
law fails to specify exactly what a "reasonable suspicion" is). If police or
other state officials don't follow up, the law also allows Arizona residents
to sue the state for failing to abide by the letter of the law.

In addition, the new law makes it a crime for illegal immigrants to work or
solicit work in Arizona or to pick up a day laborer for work if the vehicle
impedes traffic. It also makes a day laborer subject to criminal charges if
he or she is picked up, and the vehicle involved impedes traffic.

After signing the bill into law, Brewer claimed that its critics were
"overreacting." But when asked what reasonable criteria could used to
establish suspicion of someone's legal status, Brewer answered, "I don't
know. I do not know what an illegal immigrant looks like."

That's precisely the problem. The law is an open invitation to racial
profiling.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

ACTIVISTS ARE not sitting back while the law goes into effect. This
legalized bigotry is prompting a groundswell of protests across the state
and the country in defense of immigrant rights.

In Tucson, for example, two rallies took place just on the day the law was
signed. Motorists downtown watched as students walked out of their schools
and down Congress Street to congregate outside the Federal Building in the
morning. Activists from the Coalicion de Derechos Humanos (Coalition of
Human Rights) said that this protest was "no one group; it was everybody."

More than 500 people, mostly students, came out with signs and bullhorns,
despite the fact that the call for a protest did not go out until 10 a.m.
Many of the protesters had not even been aware of the demonstration until
they received a text or a Facebook invitation, or heard that their
classmates were going.

As students sang "Sí, se puede, sí, sí, se puede!" motorists in the streets
honked their horns in rhythm to the beat, and students responded with loud
cheers. Local Tucson police scuttled around in an attempt to redirect
morning traffic.

One participant said that she was "glad to catch them by surprise." As one
organizer told the crowd, "We will not let them take this moment away." As
the students, some as young as middle school, cheered with their hands in
the air, their voices were drowned out by passing city busses honking their
horns in support.

Later the same afternoon, protestors rallied at Armory Park and marched to
the Federal Building with students from Tucson High. Nearly 600 people
marched down Congress Street, protesting Brewer's signature on the bill.

As organizers reminded participants to stay on the sidewalks, one shouted
into a bullhorn, "We are not criminals. We are a community that demands
respect! They hope that 1070 will divide our community. They are wrong. We
are connected in ways they will never understand."

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

COMMUNITY GROUPS, students and activists have been rallying and organizing
against SB 1070 since the law was first proposed. One of the most visible
protests occurred on April 21 as a group of nine students chained themselves
to the Capitol building and were arrested.

Another protest took place at the Capitol building a day later, and many
smaller ones have happened across the state, and even outside of the state.
Many more are scheduled in the days and weeks ahead.

SB 1070 does not go into effect for 90 days after the legislature closes
sessions. Activists must now keep up the pressure against the state as
schools close for summer.

On April 25, the Rev. Al Sharpton, announced that his National Action
Network would organize "freedom walkers" to challenge the Arizona bill, just
as freedom riders challenged segregation decades ago. "We will go to Arizona
when this bill goes into effect and walk the streets with people who refuse
to give identification and force arrest," Sharpton said Sunday in New York.

U.S. Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.) is also calling on businesses and groups
looking for convention and meeting locations to boycott Arizona--a call that
is being taken up by many activists across the U.S.

The furor over the bill pressured President Barack Obama to criticize the
law. He called it "misguided" and said that it threatens to "undermine basic
notions of fairness that we cherish as Americans." Obama promised to use the
federal government's power to take on SB 1070.

But we can't wait on the federal government to challenge a law that will
destroy lives from the day it goes into effect. This racist attack must be
met with continued resistance locally and nationally. SB 1070 can become a
lightning rod for building an immigrant rights movement that is already
beginning to gain energy and momentum.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

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ISO Resources:
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socialistworker.org
isreview.org
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-- 
karen medina
<~~~~~~~~~~~~~>
"In this universe, we are given two gifts: the ability to love, and the
ability to ask questions." (Mary Oliver, American poet)
A third gift is the ability to laugh. (Jenifer, a friend)

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