Robert Gittelson: Report on LA Immigration March and Rally

Robert Gittleson has a recent report on an immigration rally a week ago in Los Angeles:

The events of last Saturday were simply amazing. We started off with a rally in front of the Van Nuys Civic Center. The crowds started arriving by about 9:30, even though the event wasn’t scheduled to begin until 11:00.

We had a very uplifting rally. The rally was MC’d by my friend Raul Murillo, President of Hermandad Mexicana Nacional Los Angeles, who is a great public and motivational speaker. We had a very diverse group of speakers at the rally. Some of the highlights were the Rev. Leonard Jackson of the Mayor’s office, who fired up the crowd, as well as Rosa Posada of the Union de Guatamaltecas, Pastor Bridie Roberts of CLUE LA, Diego Cap of CHIRLA”s day laborer project, and many more.

I read a prepared statement from Congressman Xavier Baccerra that was optimistic.

We marched over 1,000 strong to the Church on the Way, were we had one of the best panel discussions that I’ve seen on the issue of Comprehensive Immigration Reform (CIR), (if I say so myself). I deferred on being a panelist, although I did kick things off by welcoming the crowd, giving a few thanks, and mentioning a couple of things; first, I reminded everyone that the special election results from Massachusetts didn’t necessarily mean much in terms of CIR, since we were never going to pass CIR on a straight up or down 60 vote democratic super-majority filibuster proof vote. This has always been a bi-partisan issue. Second, that when the discussion about CIR does heat up in earnest, that a lot of misinformation, propaganda, and spin would be heard from opponents of CIR, and that everyone needed to have the facts at their fingertips so that this issue could be discussed based on the facts. I explained that this panel of experts was there today to give them the real facts, which clearly do support CIR.

Pastor JIm Tolle, who moderated the panel discussion, is a special person. He connects with people from both sides of this debate, and is extremely clear thinking and uplifting. He’s one of the good guys. Rep. Judy Chu spoke passionately and eloquently about her personal experience, being the daughter of immigrants, and started her discussion by tracing this issue back to the Chinese Exclusion Act, and built it from there. She spoke for about 15 minutes, and explained clearly the politics of this issue.

My fellow Full Rights for Immigrants Coalition member Juan Jose Gutierrez, (who along with Angelica Salas is probably the leading Hispanic advocate in Los Angeles in terms of being on the news every night commenting on this issue. Walking down the streets of L.A. with him is like walking with a rock star), gave an impassioned speech that fired up the crowd. I have dubbed it the “No Se Peude” speech. You will love it, as it basically speaks to your “enforcement now, enforcement forever” philosophy.

Rev. Alexei Smith of the Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles gave a low key but informational talk about the church’s policy in favor of CIR. Angelica Salas made her usual great PowerPoint presentation, speaking alternately in English and Spanish, and might have been the highlight speaker of the panel. She is very good, and engaged the crowd, explaining how they can and should be involved. Bernie Wolfsdorf of AILA always prepares a great presentation. He started by going into both old and new testament arguments in favor of CIR, and then segwayed into a discussion about the factual numbers of ICE detentions, and brought it all together in a convincing argument for CIR.

Humberto Gomez, Executive Dir. of LIUNA rocked the house, speaking in Spanish, he discussed his having started in the fields in 1965, working at Cesar Chavez’s side building up the UFW, and had the crowd alternately laughing and cheering for about 15 minutes.

Prof. Manuel Pastor made a very thoughtful PowerPoint presentation documenting his recent study that concluded that CIR would benefit the economy of CA. by over $16 Billion per year, and documented why the facts were so important to the economic arguments that favor this issue. Dr. Juan Hernandez also spoke in Spanish, and closed with a brilliant discussion of the politics of this issue, looked at from both sides of the aisle, and implored, (as did Angelica), the crowd to get involved, call the White House, and to be heard on this issue.

The event was very professionally taped by the church. Right now, I have the raw 1 hour 45 minute tape of the panel, but we are breaking it down into sub-10 minute chapters, so that we can post the presentations on YouTube. It is a very worthwhile discussion to watch.

I would also mention that on Tuesday of this week, our coalition called a Press Conference to denounce Santa Clarita City Councilman Bob Kellar, (who I have dubbed “Bob the Racist”), for his anti-immigrant remarks at a Minuteman rally that were caught on YouTube. By now, I’m sure that you must have heard about it. Tons of media attended our press conference, and I had hoped that this attention would demonstrate the divisiveness that racism brings to this already divisive issue. See http://standing-firm.com/2010/01/29/%E2%80%9Cbob-the-racist%E2%80%9D-vs-the-full-rights-for-immigrants-coalition/

 Unfortunately, the city council decided to sweep this under the rug, and Kellar, far from backing down, had doubled down by declaring that he stands by his words. In the wake of all of this press coverage of the racism that exists here in SoCal, the L.A. County Supervisor for that district, Mike Antonovich not only ignored this issue, but went on record against Manny Pastor’s work, calling it meaningless and insignificant in the press the other day. Now, our coalition, far from backing down, has called a press conference for Tuesday at the Board of Supervisors Office, demanding that at minimum, Antonovich denounch the anti-Latino racism that has been well documented to exist in his district, (in addition to the Santa Clarita Fiasco, his district attracted a lot of recent attention for the mandatory e-verify ordinance in the City of Lancaster).

We are also demanding action by the City of Santa Clarita, as Bob Kellar clearly violated that city’s own “Code of Ethics.”

KJ