Support Immigrant Rights in the Northwest

The past few months have seen mass mobilizations of immigrants and their allies in the streets of the nation and throughout the Northwest. Days of Action in March, April and May brought out hundreds of thousands of people in cities and towns like Salem, Boise, Seattle and Medford; nationally, the number is estimated to be in the millions.

The December House passage of H.R. 4437, known as the “Sensenbrenner-King bill,” helped coalesce the frustrations of immigrants and the work of immigrant and human rights activists into visible actions in the street. If enacted, the Sensenbrenner-King bill would severely impact immigrants’ rights. It would make any relative, employer, coworker, clergyman, lawyer, or friend of an undocumented immigrant into an “alien smuggler” and a criminal. It would also make eleven million undocumented immigrants—and legal visitors with temporary status problems—into criminals permanently barred from immigration status. Protesters were speaking out against this bill, and seeking broader immigration reform that recognizes the rights of immigrants to security and just treatment. Immigrants and their allies also wanted to demonstrate the crucial economic role and the economic power immigrants have in the United States.

Idaho Community Action Network (ICAN), Comité Pro-Amnistía General y Justicia Social in Seattle, Unete in rural Southern Oregon, and Latinos Unidos Siempre in Salem, Oregon are a few of the Social Justice Fund NW grantees who helped mobilize record numbers of immigrants and their allies into the streets of the Northwest.

For these Social Justice Fund NW grantees working on immigrant rights issues, situating the current immigration reform movement in the United States’ history and political and economic structures is a crucial part of their work.

As Leo Morales of Idaho Community Action Network says, ICAN seeks “immigration reform that is consistent with our historical past” as a nation of immigrants. As Carlos Marentes of Comité Pro-Amnistía General y Justicia Social emphasizes, “the situation is a reflection of the hypocrisy of capital investments moving to maximize profits” while people are not permitted to travel to maximize their and their families’ ability to survive. Marentes also believes that immigrants are being scapegoated for a system that has shifted resources away from the public and moved them into the private sector, with an after-effect of vilifying social services themselves.

Cross-issue and cross-constituency mobilization and collaboration is a common value and goal among these grantees. Comité sees the recent anti-immigrant legislation as a serious call to other struggles to find points of unity to work together. As Carlos Marentes says, "This is one of the more visible issues with the possibility to change things, but the immigrant rights groups can’t do it alone. They need the social welfare rights groups, women’s reproductive rights groups, indigenous rights groups and LGBT rights groups.”" Marentes believes all these issues come from the same foundation, and that these groups need to coalesce and come together, instead of "having to do it all over again in 20 to 30 years." ICAN is working with other organizations that have not traditionally taken on issues of immigration to shift the anti-immigrant consciousness in Idaho and make policy gains.

As these organizations celebrate their success with the recent Days of Action, they are planning their next steps to build on the energy created by the mobilizations.

According to Leo Morales of ICAN, the best way to combat the anti-immigrant atmosphere is to infuse a different language into the political debate. The language currently dehumanizes immigrants and people of color; there needs to be "recognition of immigrants as our neighbors." ICAN is working to infuse this language in its work, and shift Idaho’s shared consciousness about immigrants and their rightful place in the state. This includes a campaign around the DREAM Act, which is intended to open the doors of higher education to immigrant students. Ultimately, ICAN hopes our congressional and policy leaders are able to think more long-term about the path the country is taking and not think narrowly about short-term victories. According to Morales, "how policy makers address issues of immigration will determine what country we are and what we stand for. We should choose a path that is consistent with our historical past and offer a path to citizenship because that is part of our historical reality."

Comité Pro-Amnistía General y Justicia Social is continuing to work towards its organizational goals, including continuing to build its political education and community organizing work, and getting members mobilized to increase their participation in determining what Comité does on a political level. According to Carlos Marentes of Comité, the organization has received a clear message from its members that immigration reform, particularly the elements found in the McCain-Kennedy bill are what it should be working on in the upcoming year. As Carlos says, Comité “has been consolidating the energy that has been expressing itself on the street. We just need to give it shape so it can take form.” Comité is also trying to do is make sure that people understand that immigration rights is really about labor rights, civil rights and human rights.

Latinos Unidos Siempre in Salem Oregon has reactivated its YQUE (Youth on a Quest Unite and Empower) network in response to the recent attacks against the immigrant community. YQUE brings together progressive youth and their organizations to build a regional network, and provides political education, community organizing, and leadership development with its members.

Comité, the From Hate to Hope coalition, and other Washington State Social Justice Fund NW grantees, are also beginning to organize against Initiative I-946. If approved, I-946 would prohibit all individuals from receiving nonfederal public benefits unless they have verified their identity and immigration status with local and state governments. Some of these benefits include Children's Health Programs, the Pregnant Women's Program and various child care programs. Failing to report violations would result in a misdemeanor charge against the individual working for the government. The public would also be allowed to file a private lawsuit against the government if they felt this law was not being followed (Washington ACLU). I-946 is almost a carbon copy of Arizona’s Proposition 200, an anti-immigrant referendum that passed in 2004. Proposition 200 is currently tied up in Arizona courts, particularly because of the unclear definition of “public benefits,” but it has opened the door for hundreds of pieces of additional anti-immigrant legislation.

As Leo Morales of ICAN says “We find ourselves in historic times.” Social Justice Fund NW grantees are helping lead and shape these times.