Over 200 pro-immigrant activists and organizations including ANSWER New Mexico (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism) held signs Sept. 1 denouncing the targeting of immigrants.
Women led spirited chanting by the pro-immigrant rights community and their families. Chants of “The people united will never be defeated!” and “Susana escucha, estamos en la lucha” could be heard from a block away. Protesters were referring to anti-immigrant New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez’s recent attacks on the community.
Martinez will convene a legislative session in early September in an attempt to revoke the driver’s licenses of immigrants in New Mexico. The governor is singling out workers’ licenses and allowing education, Medicaid, Medicare and other vital programs to slip by the wayside.
Her attempts to divide the community have already been stymied once. The state legislature previously rejected an attempt by Martinez and her anti-immigrant supporters to confiscate licenses.
The most important factor that pushed back the government’s attacks on working-class families was grassroots organizing and community-led struggle. The community and immigrant rights supporters do not need the corporate money that Martinez is using to fuel hatred.
A judge in Albuquerque has blocked implementation of the attempt to persecute the immigrant community through a costly “re-verification” system. The injunction, in effect until Sept. 13, temporarily halts a plan that unduly targets immigrants by making them go to centers for a costly “re-verification process.” An Immigrant Day of Action endorsed by Somos Un Pueblo Unido is planned at the Santa Fe state capitol for Sept. 8 at noon.
Immigrant families and the pro-immigrant community, including ANSWER New Mexico and LGBT allies as well as youth, will sustain the fight-back movement. ¡La lucha obrera no tiene fronteras!
