Los Angeles Times (California)
By Kate Linthicum
April 30, 2014
When
immigration activists take to the streets Thursday for a series of May
Day marches in downtown Los Angeles, their message will be largely
directed at President Obama.
"The
president needs to be pressured to use the authority that he has to
keep families together," said the Rev. David Farley, pastor at Echo Park
United Methodist Church,
who is helping to organize the protests.
As
the window for Congress to pass an immigration overhaul bill narrows,
activists are increasingly turning their attention to the president,
urging him to use his executive
powers to slow deportations. In actions across the country, protesters
have labeled Obama "deporter in chief."
Activists
cite immigration statistics showing that deportations have risen since
Obama took office. But a recent Times analysis of the statistics shows
that much of that
rise is attributable to a change in the way deportations are counted.
In fact, immigrants living illegally in most of the continental U.S. are
less likely to be deported today than before Obama came to office,
according to the data.
Stephen
Legomsky, a professor of immigration law who previously served in the
Obama administration as chief counsel for U.S. Citizenship and
Immigration Services, says
activists are unfair and unwise to target Obama.
He
pointed to the presidential order known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, which grants temporary legal status to immigrants
who were brought to the United
States as children, as proof of Obama's efforts to bring relief to some
immigrants.
"At
a time when the opposing party has been relentlessly attacking the
administration in the hope of gaining control of Congress, the friendly
fire from those who have
every reason to be supportive is not just unfair and mystifying, it is
damaging," Legomsky said.
Maria
Elena Durazo, the head of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor,
which is organizing one of Thursday's marches, says it is essential to
keep the heat on Obama,
who recently ordered the director of the Homeland Security Department
to review the way immigration laws are handled.
"The
facts on the ground are that it's still a crisis," Durazo said, citing
members of her union who face deportation even though they did not
commit serious crimes. "I
think that he needs to do a lot more."
She
said the president could start by cutting back on a program that
instructs local law enforcement officers to collaborate with federal
immigration agents in order to
identify and deport people who are in the country illegally.
Durazo
said her group would also continue to put pressure on House
Republicans, who have not taken up a vote on a bipartisan bill passed by
the Senate last year that would
lay out a path for people here illegally to apply for citizenship.
Immigrant supporters have asked members of Congress to vote on the
Senate bill or to craft a similar law that achieves the same thing.
Republican leaders in the House have said they will take
up a series of smaller bills instead, with a priority on securing the
nation's borders before any path to citizenship is granted.
Organizers
of Thursday's marches say they don't expect the crowds to be anywhere
near the size they were in 2006, when hundreds of thousands of people
turned out in Los
Angeles to protest proposed legislation that would have classified
immigrants in the country illegally as felons.
Traditionally
a day of protest for the labor movement, May Day has in recent years
also become a national day of protest for immigrant rights groups. The
first protest
Thursday is scheduled to begin at 10 a.m. at the intersection of Cesar
E. Chavez Avenue and North Broadway. Co-organized by labor and immigrant
rights groups, protesters will call for an end to deportations as well
as a higher minimum wage for workers.
Other immigrant groups are planning protests downtown later that day.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
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