BY HOLLY HARKNESS
DETROIT - Chanting, "Raza Sí, Migra No!" 150 people marched
down Vernor Avenue in southwest Detroit November 7 to oppose
stepped-up immigration raids here. This was the first immigrant
rights march in the Detroit Mexican community in recent times.
Local residents have become increasingly angered by Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) raids at nearby factories, parks, and homes. The immigration cops also picked up undocumented workers as they were leaving an English- language class at Holy Redeemer Church. Organized protests against the INS dragnet targeting of Mexican workers have been gaining momentum.
In early October protesters picketed the INS headquarters on Jefferson Avenue. A couple weeks later 65 people turned out to confront INS agents who had been invited to speak at a meeting called by the GI Forum, a Chicano veterans organization.
One of the sponsors of the November 7 march, the Xicano Development Center, organized activists, many of them young Chicanos, to leaflet stores and churches to build the march. Local radio stations ran public service announcements for the event. The marchers were enthusiastically greeted along the route by people who came out of the shops and restaurants that line Vernor Avenue to show their support. Passing cars honked in solidarity.
About half of the participants were Chicano and Latino activists attending the Latin@s United in Labor conference in downtown Detroit. The importance of defending immigrant rights, which are increasingly under attack, not only in Detroit, but in cities across the country, was one of the main questions taken up by the conference. Participants prepared picket signs and then carpooled from their meeting to the assembly site.
They included rank-and-file United Auto Workers members from Chrysler's Jeep plant in Toledo, Ohio, and from several other auto plants in Michigan. Members of the Chicano student group MEChA at Michigan State University, Eastern Michigan University, and University of Toledo also attended, as well as activists from the Latino Workers Center and other groups in New York and members of the Communication Workers of America from Los Angeles. The United Farm Workers of America and the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC) also had representatives at the conference.
Keynote speakers at the conference included FLOC president Baldemar Velásquez and Juan José Gutiérrez from One Stop Immigration. Johanna Tablada and Félix Wilson from the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, D.C. also spoke at the event.
Buoyed by the success of the march, the Latin@s United in Labor conference voted at its final session to call for a national march for immigrant rights in Washington, D.C. on Aug. 29, 1999.