From: [1][e-mail]
Subject: [Border01] 8/28 US-Mexico Border: The Border's Summer of
Discontent
The Border's Summer of Discontent
August 28, 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
It's as if all the contradictions of the US War on Terror, immigration
reform, US-Mexico relations, free trade, and sagging economies on both
sides of the border have burst at the seams, and at the same time. As
the
record hot summer of 2007 crawls to a close, the political barometer
on
the US-Mexico border is tipping red. Barely a day goes by without
hunger
strikes, human chains, border crossing demonstrations, marches, and
calls
for economic boycotts.
In a press conference this week, Carlos Marentes, director of the El
Paso-based Border Agricultural Workers Project, said "neo-liberal"
economic policies exemplified by the North American Free Trade
Agreement
(Nafta) are sparking a growing crisis in the borderlands and beyond.
He
contended that US immigration laws and policies are shrouded in a veil
of
"hypocrisy" which views immigrant workers as an indispensable, cheap
labor
pool but then turns them into convenient political scapegoats. "We
want to
stop them, but we also need them," Marentes said.
While border protests are hardly new, what's striking about the latest
manifestations of discontent is how they are cutting across the
political
spectrum and even incorporating centrist and conservative forces that
are
increasingly frustrated by a status quo dictated in Washington and
Mexico
City.
In the wake of the US Congress' failure to pass comprehensive
immigration
reform legislation this year, several developments are rekindling
citizen
activism. Among the most important are the construction of new border
walls, long waits at border crossings, the Immigration and Customs
Enforcement (ICE) crackdown on undocumented workers, the deaths of
detained immigrants while in US custody, Border Patrol shootings, and
the
August 19 deportation of activist Elvira Arellano.
The August 8 shooting of Jose Alejandro Ortiz by the US Border Patrol
in
El Paso, Texas, unleashed a wave of indignation on the border and in
Mexico. Ortiz, who reportedly had a criminal record in both the US and
Mexico, was allegedly involved in an attempt to smuggle immigrants
when he
was fatally shot.
According to the Border Patrol's account, Ortiz threatened to throw a
rock
at a still-unidentified agent, who was forced to fire in self-defense
at
the young man. At least one witness contradicted the official version,
and
the local US attorney's office is investigating the killing. Since
Ortiz
supposedly died south of the border, Mexico's Office of the Federal
Attorney General has also opened an investigation. The Ortiz shooting
was
the fifth time El Paso Border Patrol agents have shot an undocumented
person this year, but the first fatal incident of 2007.
Ortiz's killing was condemned in strong language by Ciudad Juarez
Bishop
Renato Ascensio Leon, Chihuahua Governor Jose Reyes Baeza, Chihuahua
State
Attorney General Patricia Gonzalez and members of the federal Mexican
Congress. On Saturday, August 25, several federal congressmen from
President Calderon's center-right National Action Party leafleted
motorists crossing the Bridge of Americas between Ciudad Juarez and El
Paso. Two days earlier, Ortiz family members and supporters burned a
Border Patrol pinata at another bridge linking the two cities.
El Paso Democratic Congressman Silvestre Reyes, who headed the
El Paso Border Patrol office during the 1990s, said an investigation
of
the Ortiz killing was necessary but challenged critics he said
downplayed
the seriousness of rock-throwing against agents. "Anybody who thinks
you
can't get killed by a rock is a fool," Congressman Reyes said at an El
Paso border security conference.
The construction of new US border walls is another issue stoking anger
in
the region. While proponents of physical barriers insist the walls
will
guard against terrorists, deter illegal immigrants and curb drug
traffickers, opponents, including most Texas border city mayors,
contend
the million-dollar structures will divide sister cities, intrude on
private lands, create flood hazards, threaten ecosystems and wildlife
like
rare jaguars, and funnel undocumented immigrants to deadlier, isolated
desert crossings.
Isabel Garcia of the Tucson-based Human Rights Coalition, said more
than
200 migrants have died trying to cross the border in the
Arizona-Sonora
corridor alone since October of last year. The Arizona-Sonora border
is
"the epicenter of the war on immigrants," Garcia charged.
In opposition to border walls, a Texas-based group called Border
Ambassadors kicked off a 16-day campaign August 25 in El Paso. Led by
Jay
J. Johnson-Castro, the group organized a small human chain across the
Santa Fe Bridge between El Paso and Ciudad Juarez.
The demonstration was supported by the League for United Latin
American
Citizens, Miss Latina Texas beauty contest queens and the mayors of El
Paso and Ciudad Juarez. El Paso Mayor Cook said that people outside
the
region don't understand the "symbiotic relationship" between border
communities dependent on mutual economic, academic and social
exchanges.
Border Ambassadors plans human chains in the coming days in other
Texas-Mexico border cities.
A separate anti-wall mobilization is planned for October 11-13.
Endorsed
by 37 Western Hemisphere non-governmental groups, the action grows out
of
last year's Border Social Forum held in Ciudad Juarez. Protest
organizers
include San Antonio's Southwest Workers Union, the Border Agricultural
Workers Union, Southwest Organizing Project, and many others.
Economic grievances remain are the core of many border-area protests.
Former Bracero Program guestworkers, for instance, are renewing
demands
that the Mexican government compensate all the eligible braceros who
had
money deducted from their paychecks decades ago for savings accounts
that
never materialized.
On Monday, August 27, nine women initiated a week-long hunger strike
in El
Paso against the North American Free Trade Agreement, the conditions
of
women workers and treatment of immigrants in the US. Organized by La
Mujer
Obrera, a longtime group of former garment industry workers, the
hunger
strikers demand investment in women-centered economic development
enterprises.
In Tijuana and Ciudad Juarez, meanwhile, thousands of teachers are
expected to hold a border demonstration August 31 to protest the
Mexican
government's passage of a new social security law that lengthens
retirement age eligibility requirements and sets the stage for the
privatization of pension accounts.
Building on a trend that's developed over the past few years, the
latest
round of border activism is connected to issues affecting communities
across North America. In Prince William County, Virginia, the Sin
Fronteras organization launched an economic boycott this week to
protest a
new county law that gives local police immigration law enforcement
responsibilities.
In an August 27 telephone press conference, representatives of several
US-based human and rights Latino and Asian community organizations
criticized the expansion of law enforcement measures once confined to
the
border region to the interior of the United States. Activist leaders
condemned house-to-house ICE raids, alleged detention center abuses,
employer verification letters, the use of local police forces to
enforce
immigration laws, and the appearance of high-tech aircraft monitoring
communities far from the border.
Immigrant communities are in a "state of siege," charged Christian
Ramirez
of the American Friends Service Committee. Activists are "now calling
for
our communities to come together and say enough to these governmental
initiatives," Ramirez added.
Veronica Carmona, an organizer for the New Mexico-based Colonias
Development Council, told Frontera NorteSur that pro-immigrant groups
are
backing a national day of action for September 12. Carmona said the
character of the protest is still being debated.
If cross-border activism needed a media face, Elvira Arellano
certainly
provided it. The undocumented Mexican worker's long fight to remain
with
her child, a US citizen, was abruptly interrupted when ICE agents
arrested
Arellano as she was leaving a Los Angeles press conference this month.
Arellano's rapid deportation to Mexico drew the protest of the Mexican
government.
Arellano's arrest injected new life into the immigrant rights
movement,
and thousands of people streamed into the streets of Los Angeles on
August
25 chanting "We are all Elvira," a slogan evocative of the 1994 cry in
Mexico, "We are all Marcos," in allusion to the Zapatista
subcomandante.
The Arellano case received ample coverage and touched off sharp
commentary
in the Mexican media, with some outlets proclaiming the young woman as
the
"symbol" of the Mexican immigrant in the US.
Additional sources: Univison, August 18 and 27, 2008. El Universal,
August
26, 2007. Article by Julieta Martinez. El Sur, August 26, 2007.
Norte,
August 14, 16, 25 and 26, 2007. Articles by Ricardo Espinoza, Antonio
Flores Schroeder, Pablo Hernandez Batista, Jorge Chairez Daniel and
Carlos
Huerta. La Jornada, August 11, 21 and 26, 2007. Articles by Ruben
Villalpando, the Notimex news agency and editorial staff. El Paso
Times,
August 21, 24, 25 and 26, 2007. Articles by Daniel Borunda, Louie
Gilot
and Adriana M. Chavez. Lapolaka.com, August 9, 14, 25, 26, 27, 2007.
El
Diario de Juarez, August 9, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 2007.
Link to the Article:
[2]http://www.immigrantsolidarity.org/cgi-bin/datacgi/database.cgi?fil
e=Issues&report=SingleArticle&ArticleID=0944
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