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 News from Around the Americas | June 2007 
Protesters Denounce Immigration Bill
 Mariana Minaya - Washington Post
| | Scott Dibenedetto of Pahrump, Nev., videotapes one of the speakers at the March for America demonstration at the Washington Monument. (Pouya Dianat/Washington Post) |
More than 100 people gathered at the Washington Monument this weekend to protest immigration legislation that they reject as amnesty for the nation's estimated 12 million illegal immigrants.
Carrying signs with slogans such as "Reform Mexico Not the USA," and T-shirts that read "Stop illegal immigration. Ask me how," the demonstrators cheered, clapped and shouted as more than a dozen speakers from different organizations took the stage.
March for America, a group that opposes President Bush's immigration reforms, organized three days of marches and speakers across 14 states to urge tighter border protection and denounce opportunities to afford illegal immigrants a path to citizenship.
"It's an insult to the three million people who are already in line to come to America," said Jeff Lewis, deputy director of the Federal Immigration Reform and Enforcement Coalition, one of the speakers who said the recent wave of immigration was "the largest invasion in the history of the world."
The demonstration came as the U.S. Senate plans to discuss a revised bipartisan immigration bill that would revamp border protection, punish employers of illegal immigrants and provide citizenship opportunities for illegal immigrants.
Some at yesterday's event said they feared that terrorists would slip through improperly protected borders or that legal workers would increasingly lose jobs to an illegal workforce.
"The demand for legal American labor is no longer there," shouted another speaker, Miguel Cruz of the organization, You Don't Speak for Me, a group of American Hispanics opposed to illegal immigration.
"We have to change that!" replied a woman in the crowd.
While opposing amnesty for illegal immigrants, protesters said they support legal immigration.
"We need them here in reasonable numbers that allow time for them to become Americans," Lewis said.
About six counter-protesters in attendance said such demonstrations mask racism. One man carried a sign that read in Spanish: "Nadie es Ilegal" (No one is illegal). |
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