Why we're marching for America

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SANDY PERRY: Why are people marching in this March for America? 

CESAR JUAREZ: People are demanding a comprehensive immigration reform, including a stop to immigration raids; respect for civil, labor, and human rights; and jobs, housing, and health care for all of us. 

In particular, we want to pressure the United States Senate to introduce legislation to fix the broken immigration system we have now. The current system does not reflect true American values, such as family unity, rights of workers, and the dignity of human beings. Fair immigration reform would recognize the contributions of immigrants and provide a just process for legalization. 

PERRY: Why do you include economic demands like housing and health care when you talk about immigration reform?

JUAREZ: Well, for one thing, immigrants need economic access to jobs, housing, and education just like everyone else. For example, the recent health care reform bill passed by Congress deliberately excludes all undocumented immigrants and many who are legal immigrants also. Immigrants have the same economic needs and economic rights as everyone else does. 

For another thing, when immigrants get legalized, it benefits the entire community. It helps the people who work alongside them to be able to organize unions and get better wages and benefits. This happened when the 1986 amnesty was passed. Also, when immigrants can become citizens and vote, it helps to get candidates elected who will fight for jobs, housing, and health care. Legalization of immigrants also helps to create new jobs, because some of them start new businesses. 

In recent years, immigrants have chosen to march on May 1 because it is International Workers Day. This is the day that honors the contributions of workers and is celebrated all over the world. Most immigrants in America are workers, including the 12 million who are undocumented and the 20 million who came in with documents over the past 20 years. Immigrants build our buildings, grow and pick our food, cook, clean our houses, work in our restaurants, and clean our hotels. The children of immigrants are some of the most talented students in our schools and universities. 

PERRY: How do you answer the people who say that immigrants take jobs away from people that are citizens? 

JUAREZ: I answer that it is false. Americans lost over 8 million jobs in the last two years. But everyone knows that the number of immigrants actually decreased during that time. So what is really causing the job losses? The American economy is broken. It is based on private profit. Global corporations are trying to increase profits by eliminating jobs through off-shoring and automation. They do not care about any of our jobs, whether we are citizens or immigrants. 

The corporations blame immigrants to divert us from looking at the real causes of unemployment – them and the broken system they are part of. It is also a divide and conquer tactic to prevent us from coming together as workers to fight for the basic things we all need - housing, health care, and education. 

The anti-immigrant law SB 1070 that was just passed in Arizona is an example of this. It is a major violation of American civil rights and values, because it requires racial profiling based on skin color and accent. But it is also a major diversion. How can we fight for real health care reform for everyone, or a real plan to stop foreclosures, if we spend all our time attacking immigrants? Immigrant rights are human rights too, just like the right to housing, health care and education. We call our May 1 march the “March for America”, because we believe this is what America is all about.