Posted on 03/12/2008 6:41:56 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
"Yo Tengo Fe," they sang from the steps of the City-County Building. At their feet were cardboard silhouettes representing 24 undocumented immigrants seized in the Madison area last month by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE.
"I Have Faith," translated Hector Rubalcava, who led the handful of activists in song Monday. "We sing of the people's faith that the equality they long for will come," he said.
The cardboard silhouettes bore no names, but were hand-lettered in Spanish in such terms as "daughter," "worker," "father," "spouse," "fiancee."
The rally in the chilly late afternoon was called by the Immigrant Workers' Union to draw attention to increasingly frequent raids by ICE. Since the U.S. Department of Homeland Security boosted its staffing, ICE has twice in the past year swept through Dane County in search of immigration "fugitives" who failed to appear for a hearing or absconded after a deportation order. But both sweeps also netted undocumented immigrants who were not under prosecution for their status.
ICE typically does not identify those it takes into custody.
"They are nameless and faceless. They can't talk," Yvonne Geerts said of the cardboard cutouts. "We don't know who they were or where they come from, but they were here. They were members of our community."
"They are using us for politics, instead of the promised reform," Alex Gillis, an Immigrant Workers' Union founder, said of the U.S. government. "They are destroying our families and breaking up our community," he told a group of mostly local media.
"We are asking the sheriff to do the right thing," Gillis said. "The sheriff is playing politics with our families."
Dane County Sheriff David Mahoney has come under fire for the jail practice of notifying ICE when an undocumented immigrant is in custody. No law requires this, but Mahoney told a recent hearing packed with opponents of the practice that he thought it wise to cooperate with other law enforcement agencies. The county corporation counsel is investigating whether the practice violates a County Board resolution requiring immigration status to be kept private except in criminal matters.
"We are immigrants, we are not terrorists," Rubalcava called from the steps. "We have come to clear your toilets."
Karin Sandvik watched from the sidewalk. "This needs to be straightened out," she said, attributing the immigrants' need to come to the United States to trade policies. A senior citizen who lives downtown, she remarked, "It's sad how little attention is paid" to the immigration issue in her social circle.
Gillis said that the climate of fear in the immigrant community kept many away from the rally, but promised Monday's gathering was only the first of many to bring attention to the issue.
WTF? Lost in translation, maybe? *SMIRK*
Goodness! Things have come down a bit from the “Si, se puede!” halcyon days.
I clean my own damn toilet and I cut my own grass.
GTFO!
I want to be at the next one. I'll provide another batch of silhouettes with different titles: "indigent patient who finally drove the local hospital out of business", "drunk driver", "hit and run driver who had no insurance, no license, and no registration", "taker of construction jobs", "burden on local welfare rolls", "drug mule", "source of widespread food poisoning event", etc.
Brilliant! :)
Excellent!
Na, na, na, na... na, na, na, na... hey, hey, hey... hasta la vista.
Boo-friggin’-Hoo!
Isn't being "in custody" (jail) suggestive of "criminal matters"?
Seriously - the degree of assumed entitlement among illegal immigrants and the networks that supporting them is stunning.
Yo tengo fe, but not in my country (Mexico).
Should have been the whole quote.
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