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Immigration rallies target Congress
Lawmakers divided over offering legal status to workers
BY JENNIFER A. DLOUHY
Hearst Newspapers
WASHINGTON — The massive demonstrations Monday for more liberal immigration policies were aimed at the 535 members of Congress who are deadlocked over offering legal status to more than 11 million undocumented workers in the U.S.
On one side of the stalemate is a get-tough approach favored by the House of Representatives, which last year passed legislation that would build a fence along much of the U.S.-Mexico border and make it a felony to be in the U.S. illegally.
The Senate was ready last week to adopt a compromise that combined some get-tough elements with a guest-worker program that would have put the vast majority of the illegal immigrants now living in the United States on a path to eventual citizenship.
But that measure, negotiated by key Republican senators, capsized when Republicans who opposed it wanted to offer at least 20 amendments; Democratic leaders vowed to block more than a handful of amendments.
Demonstrators in more than 65 cities made it clear Monday that Congress was the target of their message.
"Communities of immigrants and non-immigrants around the country are organizing in ways we have never seen before to send Congress and the Bush administration a message," said Gustavo Torres, executive director of CASA of Maryland, a community group that helps Latino immigrants. "What was once a sleeping giant is now wide awake."
Demonstrators complained that the House's get-tough approach was inhumane.
The bill "violates our most basic American values," said Abdul Kamus, one march organizer. "It would rip families apart."
When lawmakers return to Capitol Hill in late April after a two-week recess, the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold more hearings and send a new immigration bill to the full Senate by May 4.
The issue is a tense, political one that divides the Republican Party and puts the Senate and House at odds with each other. Democratic members of the House and Senate generally favor a more liberal approach that would give illegal immigrants a chance to work legally in the United States and — eventually — apply for citizenship.
Immigration-rights advocates who organized the rallies Monday said they hoped the demonstrations will persuade moderate lawmakers to support a more liberal plan.
Rallies took place in communities of all sizes, from a gathering of at least 50,000 people in Atlanta to one involving 3,000 people in the farming town of Garden City, Kan., which has fewer than 30,000 residents.
Organizers of a New York rally claimed 150,000 participants at City Hall, and in Washington, organizers said crowds reached their goal of 180,000. Police would not give estimates in either case.
Monday's demonstrations followed a weekend of rallies in 10 states that drew up to 500,000 people in Dallas and tens of thousands elsewhere. Dozens of other rallies, many organized by Spanish-language radio DJ's, have been held nationwide over the past two weeks, including one with more than 500,000 people in Los Angeles.
Demonstrators in New York City held signs with slogans such as "We Are America," "Immigrant Values are Family Values," and "Legalize Don't Criminalize." One sign said: "Bush Step Down."
"We love this country. This country gives to us everything," said Florentino Cruz, 32, an illegal worker from Mexico who has been in the United States since 1992. "This country was made by immigrants."
Reminiscent of the civil rights protests and anti-war demonstrations of the 1960s and 1970s, the coast-to-coast rallies displayed what organizers described as an emerging social and political force as immigrants find their voice.
"You're what this debate is about," Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., co-sponsor of a leading immigration bill, told demonstrators on the National Mall just blocks from the U.S. Capitol. "Some in Congress want to turn America away from its true spirit. They believe immigrants are criminals. And they're wrong."
Guierine Donis, wearing a T-shirt and visor that read "Stop HR-4437" to a rally in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., said the House bill would deprive immigrants of "education and all the rights we deserve."
Meanwhile, some Republicans staunchly opposed to anything that hints of "amnesty" for illegal immigrants apply that label to guest-worker programs.
Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., who heads the 94-member House Immigration Reform Caucus that wants to crack down on illegal immigration, said the rallies Monday should turn off lawmakers.
"The illegal alien lobby has upgraded its PR, instructing protestors to trade in their foreign flags for red, white and blue," he said. "But make no mistake about it: Amnesty is an affront to American law and America's tradition of legal immigration. If the protesters really want to honor America's values, they would stand up to lawbreakers and embrace an enforcement-first approach to fixing our broken system."
Reults of an ABC News/Washington Post poll released Monday showed that 63 percent of those surveyed said they favor allowing undocumented immigrants who are already working in the U.S. to apply for legal status and later citizenship if they pay a fine and back taxes.
In contrast, only 14 percent favored a plan to let illegal immigrants stay and work for a limited number of years before having to return to their home countries — an alternative pushed by Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Jon Kyl, R-Ariz. About 20 percent said illegal immigrants should be declared felons and offered no temporary work program, a stand that corresponds with the legislation approved by the House.
The poll found that respondents' biggest concern wasn't job security, but nonpayment of taxes by illegal immigrants. A third of those polled said their chief concern is that immigrants use more publicly funded services than they pay taxes to cover.
This report includes information from the Associated Press, Bloomberg News Service, Knight Ridder News Service and Washington Post.
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© 2006 St. Paul Pioneer Press and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved.
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