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May 5, 2009 Immigrant Activist Runs for Mexican CongressThe swine flu might have closed Mexican schools and slowed the nation's economy to a near standstill, but it didn’t stop the latest political campaign from getting off the ground. Although campaign kick-off events mainly proceeded last weekend without the usual bluster, candidates from Mexico’s different political parties launched their bids for positions in the lower house of the Mexican Congress. In July, Mexican voters will go to the polls to elect new federal representatives. Among the better known candidates running for Congress is Elvira Arellano, the deported activist from the United States who came to symbolize the face of the new immigrant movement. Taking refuge in a Chicago church in August 2006, Arellano defied a deportation order and US immigration authorities for one year in an unsuccessful attempt to remain with her young son. In August 2007, she was arrested and sent back to Mexico after appearing at an immigrant rights rally in Los Angeles. Almost two years later, Arellano is on the campaign trail in Tijuana, Baja California, where she is the candidate for Congressional District #4 on the ticket of the center-left Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD). Keeping true to her word to keep the migrant issue alive in the public eye, the energetic activist is stressing immigrant rights issues in Mexico’s 2009 political campaign. In comments last weekend, Arellano said she is especially concerned about the fate of women migrants who pass through Mexico on their way to the US, a journey that is often fraught with sexual assaults and other abuses. "I am going to seek laws in Congress that protect women, and also that protect undocumented Central Americans who are treated like criminals in Mexico," Arellano said. Noting Tijuana’s character as a city of migrants, Arellano said she expected her message to receive a positive response from voters. Arellano’s election run is the latest instance of a one-time Mexican migrant jumping into the political ring south of the border. Individuals like Arellano, who have experiences with laws, governments and civil societies on both sides of the border, are gradually making their mark on Mexican politics. Perhaps the best-known example of a migrant-turned-politician prior to Arellano is the late Andres Tomato King” Bermudez, who made good in California before returning to the state of Zacatecas and taking a stab at becoming mayor of the town of Jerez. Initially denied a victory as a PRD candidate, Bermudez subsequently won the top job in Jerez as the representative for the center-right National Action Party in 2004. The flamboyant politician went on to win a Congressional seat for the same political party in 2006, becoming one of current President Felipe Calderon’s most virulent defenders in the post-election conflict that surrounded the contested presidential election three years ago. Bermudez died of cancer earlier this year while still serving as a federal legislator. Sources: La Jornada, May 4, 2009. El Universal, May 3, 2009. Article by Julieta Martinez. Lapolaka.com, May 3. 2009. Los Angeles Times, August 21, 2007, and February 8, 2009. Articles by Teresa Watanabe and Sam Quinones. Msnbc.com/Associated Press, August 20, 2007. Frontera NorteSur (FNS): on-line, U.S.-Mexico border news Center for Latin American and Border Studies New Mexico State University Las Cruces, New Mexico 12 Million People will not "Self-Deport"Elvira Arellano
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My thoughts today are with my companera Flor Crisotomo who informs me that she is going to New York for the March Against Racism and Lou Dobbs on Martin Luther King’s birthday.
Flor was arrested in the national Homeland Security raids on the IFCO Company in April of 2006. She has exhausted her appeals and she is scheduled for deportation on January 28th.
We fought hard together for legalization and she emerged as the leader of the IFCO workers across the nation. Together we carried out a long hunger strike and led a march of 50,000 people calling for a moratorium on raids and deportations. With the support of the community and our Latino elected officials we won a one-year continuance for the workers over the objections of Homeland Security.
Where are we now in our long struggle? The Congress has failed to act to fix the broken law. Homeland security arrested 38,000 workers last year. 54% of Latinos fear everyday that a loved one or friend or family member will be arrested. The plan, evidently, is to make the rest of the 12 million "self-deport".
That will never happen. It will not happen because of U.S. policies like NAFTA that are still destroying jobs in Mexico. NAFTA was the reason that Flor and I both went to the U.S. in the first place. We did not go for the American Dream. We went because of what the American nightmare had done to our communities and our country.
With the final elimination of the tariffs on corn and beans it is estimated that a million more Mexicans will be unable to make a living on the land and will head for the border. With people still coming and no way to survive in Mexico, what makes the U.S. government think 12 million undocumented workers will "self-deport"?
When I went to the United States I went to support my parents and my sisters. I had a son who is a U.S. citizen and I was determined, like millions of other people with U.S. citizen families, to give him the opportunities he had a right to. So I fought to stay and not be separated from him.
Flor went to the United States to work and send money back home to her children and her elderly mother who cares for them. The tightening of the border meant she could not travel back and forth to see them – and yet their survival depended on what money she could make and send to them.
In both our cases, the combination of NAFTA and the system of undocumented labor meant the separation of families. It is a cruel and inhuman system and it must be ended. I believe the government knows that arresting 38,000 people every year will not make 12 million people self-deport when NAFTA is still taking away jobs in Mexico. It will only drive the 12 million – and the whole Latino community – further into the shadows of fear and discrimination and family separation. They aren’t ending the system of undocumented labor; they are just making it harder on us.
Flor asked me what she should do. "Should I return to my children in Mexico with nothing to offer them after seven years of hard work and watch their lives be destroyed in front of my eyes?"
I told Flor that she must decide. Perhaps the greatest gift she can give her children is the example of her struggle and her dignity.
We must make America see what they are doing.
Sanctuary's Human Face
By Aarti Shahani
Jan/Feb 2008
Feature article on Elvira Arellano in the Jan/Feb 2008 issue of COLORLINES.
A CALL TO SUPPORT ELVIRA ARRELLANO
August 2006
At its last meeting on Tuesday August 22, the May 1st Coalition agreed to support the case of Elvira Arellano.
In case you are not familiar with the case, Elvira Arellano is a 31-year-old Mexicana single mother, who is quickly becoming a symbol of struggle for millions of undocumented workers who strive to keep their families together.
Arellano has lived in the U.S. since 1997. She has a seven year old son, Saul who has various health problems. To protect her son Elvira defied a Department of Homeland Security deportation order.
On Aug. 15, Arellano and her son entered the Adalberto United Methodist Church , on Chicago ’s West Side claiming sanctuary so that she would not be deported. The church and the primarily Puerto Rican membership wholeheartedly support her.
Download PDF fact sheet on Elvira |
She is being called the Rosa Parks of the immigrant rights movement and our coalition agrees.
This case could be a watershed case in stopping the brutal and unjust deportations that are sweeping the country.
In the next few days you will be hearing more about Elvira’s case. The May 1st coalition will join many such efforts and also launch a campaign in her support.
In the meantime, we urge you to support the calls of her supporters to do the following:
- Write letters to Illinois Senators Richard Durbin and Barack Obama urging them to prevent her deportation.
For Senator Durbin visit: http://durbin.senate.gov/contact.cfm#contact
For Senator Obama: http://obama.senate.gov/contact/index.php - Send letters to the Chicago Sun Times asking them to stop demonizing Elvira as well as all immigrants. Their email is letters@suntimes.com
- Send letters of support directly to Elvira at the organization she works with and who has been spearheading her support, Sin Fronteras. That email is psf@somosunpueblo.com.
- Check this email frequently about further notices on this case.
In solidarity,
Teresa Gutierrez
For the Elvira Arellano Committee of May 1st Coalition