Thousands Rally For Immigrants' Rights (CBS) PHOENIX Thousands of people across the country protested Friday against legislation cracking down on illegal immigrants, with demonstrators in Los Angeles, Phoenix and Atlanta staging school walkouts, marches and work stoppages. The House of Representatives passed legislation in December that would make it a felony to be illegally in the United States, impose new penalties on employers who hire illegal immigrants and erect fences along one-third of the U.S.-Mexican border. The Senate is set to take up its own version of immigration reform on Monday. The proposals have angered many immigrant rights groups which have promised to fight back. The Los Angeles demonstration led to fights between black and Hispanic students at one high school, but the protests were largely peaceful, authorities said. "It was horrible, horrible," Mason said. "It's ridiculous that a bunch of black students would jump on Latinos like that, knowing they're trying to get their freedom." Chantal Mason, a sophomore at George Washington Preparatory High, said black students jumped Hispanic students as they left classes to protest the House bill that would make it a felony to be in the U.S. illegally. Rep. Peter King of New York, one of the bill's sponsors, told CBS News correspondent Sandra Hughes, "The issue of illegal immigration, is not just a social issue, not just an economic issue, it's an issue of homeland security." In Phoenix, police said 10,000 demonstrators marched to the office of Republican Sen. Jon Kyl, co-sponsor of a bill that would give illegal immigrants up to five years to leave the country. The turnout clogged a major thoroughfare. "They're here for the American Dream," said Malissa Greer, 29, who joined a crowd estimated by police to be at least 10,000 strong. "God created all of us. He's not a God of the United States, he's a God of the world." Kyl had no immediate comment on the rally. The escalating controversy puts farmers such as Dewey Zapka of Weld County, Colo., right in the middle, CBS News' Jennifer Miller reports. "Let them come here legal, quit chasing them," Zapka said. "Let them be comfortable here while they're working and doing our work that nobody else will do." At least 500 students at Huntington Park High School near Los Angeles walked out of classes in the morning. Hundreds of the students, some carrying Mexican flags, walked down the middle of Los Angeles streets, police cruisers behind them. The students visited two other area high schools, trying to encourage students to join their protest, but the schools were locked down to keep students from leaving, said Los Angeles district spokeswoman Monica Carazo. In Georgia, activists said tens of thousands of workers did not show up at their jobs Friday after calls for a work stoppage to protest a bill passed by the Georgia House on Thursday. That bill, which has yet to gain approval in the state Senate, would deny state services to adults living in the U.S. illegally and impose a 5 percent surcharge on wire transfers from illegal immigrants. Supporters say the Georgia measure is vital to homeland security and frees up limited state services for people legally entitled to them. Opponents say it unfairly targets workers meeting the demands of some of the state's largest industries. Teodoro Maus, an organizer of the Georgia protest, estimated as many as 80,000 Hispanics did not show up for work. About 200 converged on the steps of the Georgia Capitol, some wrapped in Mexican flags and holding signs reading: "Don't panic, we're Hispanic" and "We have a dream, too." Jennifer Garcia worried what would the proposal would do to her family. She said her husband is an illegal Mexican immigrant. "If they send him back to Mexico, who's going to take care of them and me?" Garcia said of herself and her four children. "This is the United States. We need to come together and be a whole." On Thursday, thousands of people filled the streets of Milwaukee for what was billed as "A Day Without Latinos" to protest efforts in Congress to target undocumented workers. Police estimated more than 10,000 people joined the demonstrations and march to downtown Milwaukee. Organizers put the number at 30,000. (© 2006 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights
I guess I find it somewhat alarming that people who are here illegally think it is acceptable to threaten us. The fact that they are waving mexican flags, not American flags, tells me all I need to know. I think it's time for them to go. We have an important election coming up. Both parties have shied away from the illegal immigration issue, because they both tacitly support it and they know it is hugely unpopular with the public at large. Now Bush and the Republicans are in the same psoition they found themselves in with the Dubai ports deal. If all their talk about terrorism and security is really true, then it is clearly madness to have unprotected borders and de facto free immigration. So they will either have to put up or shut up. To me, this looks like a gift on a silver platter for the republicans. The Democrats oppose doing anything about the illegals and Harry Reid was out vowing to filibuster the issue. The Republicans can make this the defining issue of the campaign and divert attention from all their failures.
Had they been waving the US flag instead of the Mexican flag I would of had a little more respect for them. Maybe if we boot out the illegals and cut off a good chunck of welfare the unemployment rate will go down in the country and we start to cut the deficit.
Thanks, Dems. Thanks to you and your stupid self-loathing elites encouraging our children to be ethnocentric zombies to foreign subversion. This party STILL sells its soul to Hispanics who think America is Mexico. Both parties fouled the immigration issue, but this display only makes the Dems look bad.
This is the guy I'd put out of business with punitive fines. Sorry pal, but if your business plan needs illegals for success, it's a flawed plan. Can't believe how emboldened these cockroach employers have become. "The escalating controversy puts farmers such as Dewey Zapka of Weld County, Colo., right in the middle, CBS News' Jennifer Miller reports. "Let them come here legal, quit chasing them," Zapka said. "Let them be comfortable here while they're working and doing our work that nobody else will do." "
What gets me is that they are doing work that no one else will do. It's not that we don't have the perople to do the work, instead we would rather pay folks to live in slums such as New Orleans 9th ward as opposed to them having to actually work for something.
I keep hearing they do work no one else will do, and my question is, who did that work before we were inundated with illegals? I know from personal experience that people used to do their own lawn work or force their kids to do it or hire neighborhood kids. I realize the last option is no longer viable because most of the middle class and up kids are too weak and feminized to do any manual labor, but the idea we must have illegals to function is insulting. It's not that they do work "no one else will do", it's that no one else will do it for the wages they are paying. Meanwhile we have armies of welfare recipients who are paid to sit around their government subsidized apartment and play video games and take drugs all day, when they aren't protesting about how poorly they are being treated. Cut welfare and there will be plenty of people to do those jobs.
Exactly. Americans are so brainwashed, its mindblowing. They think the Patriot Act is gonna save them with the border wide open. Stunning. And look at Bush; that grandstanding piece of S**t. He implores the nation the terror threat is so dire, we spill blood on two continents and demand we smile while congress tramples our rights - dare we be called 'unpatriotic'! Yet, he doesn't lift a finger to shutdown the most porous, illegal gateway into the country!! At best, Bush, all Republicans and all Democrats have sold this country out FOR MONEY to Corporate America. At best. At worst, they are courting disaster to justify a total Government takeover of our lives. Neo-feudalism.
Exactly!!! Another shill argument from the left and right!! But whoze gonna work dem jobs nobody elsez gonna work?!?! People who make this argument have no concept of basic economics. After the illegals are booted out, employers will be FORCED to increase wages to competitive levels if they wish to stay in business. Its that simple. AMericans won't pick fruit for three dollars an hour. But they'll do it for 10 or 12. This means the average American will be able to buy moderately less than before (prices will rise). The payoff is a stronger American middle class - which is FAR MORE important to the long term security of this country than any short term Corporate handout.