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Make the Road, IWW Unite in Call for Immigrant and Workers’ Rights

By By Alex Kane - The Indypendent, May 2, 2008

Brooklyn, New York—Around 150 people marched across the Brooklyn Bridge with Make the Road New York and the Industrial Workers of the World NYC Branch for a May Day immigrant rights demonstration. Flanked by red and black Wobbly flags and signs that read “Opportunity for Immigrant Workers,” the demonstrators chanted slogans like “Si se puede,” and “El pueblo, unido, jamas tera vencido.”

There was a boisterous rally held before the march at Cadman Plaza Park in Brooklyn, with music, dancing and chanting. One song’s lyrics, roughly translated, said “we will overcome misery” and “we’ll have to break the chains.”

“[Immigrants should] have the same rights as any other working person,” said Stephanie Basile, a member of IWW, the radical Wobbly union that has been around since 1905. Basile emphasized that workers should have the right to unionize without intimidation, and that deportations of immigrants must stop.

After the rally ended, participants marched across the Brooklyn Bridge pedestrian and bicyclist area with a police escort. The march ended with loud chants outside of City Hall that translated to “Bloomberg, listen, we are in the struggle.” In front of City Hall were at least 10 police officers, ready with nightsticks in hand for any disturbances. Make the Road NY provided transportation for the protestors from City Hall to Union Square, where a bigger rally for immigrant rights was being held.

“[Immigrants] and working people are the backbone of the United States…At the end of the day, we have to make sure that the politicians, the community and the United States know that we’re still fighting for [immigrant and workers’ rights],” said Julissa Bisono, a worker organizer with Make the Road NY, a grassroots organization that advocates for low income people and immigrants in New York City.

One young intern for Make the Road NY, Jefferson Lopez of Flatbush, spoke of the work that Make the Road NY has been doing to provide better health care for immigrant communities. “They are helping immigrants in a way that no other organization can help,” said Lopez, 18. Make the Road NY, with other immigrant rights’ groups, were instrumental in pushing for new state regulations that require hospitals to have translators for people who can’t speak English.

The new regulations, which took effect in September 2006, have improved health care services to immigrant New Yorkers who don’t speak English as their first language.

The protestors looked back in admiration at the May Day 2006 immigrant rights demonstrations, where hundreds of thousands of immigrants and their supporters protested anti-immigration laws and practices perpetrated by the federal government. The emphasis on deportation in American immigration policy seems to have chilled protests from immigrants, according to some activists.

According to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, in fiscal year 2007, over 200,000 undocumented immigrants were deported from the United States.

Many immigrants live in fear of deportation, and talk of their struggles against the often racist and xenophobic political climate in the U.S.

Felipe Romero, a restaurant worker in NYC who carries carts and a member of the IWW NYC branch for a year, spoke of discrimination in his workplace. “The manager discriminates against Hispanic people…We’re in a struggle now, trying to unionize in the workplace to be able to get better benefits and better working conditions…[Because of the union struggle], we are now getting our holidays paid, overtime paid and better wages,” said Romero, through a translator.

Other demonstrators said they hoped the struggle for workers and immigrants would continue after May Day.

“I think the more people in the streets, the bigger the statement is. And that is something that is missing in this country, people thinking and acknowledging the fact that they do have power whether they know it or not,” said Valerie Carmel, a student and activist who participated in the protest.