Immigrant rights rallies set for Monday

By Barbara Rose and Antonio Olivo
Tribune staff reporters
Published April 9, 2006

Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators are expected to turn out in cities across the country Monday to support immigrant rights.

Rallies, marches and vigils are planned in 102 cities, including Chicago, according to the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Community Change.

The largest turnouts are expected in Washington, where a rally is planned at the Washington monument, and in New York City, where three marches will converge at City Hall in lower Manhattan.

The actions are the latest expression of a grassroots movement led by a loose coalition of religious, immigrant and student groups and unions. The movement was sparked by restrictive immigration proposals in Congress, which is debating how to overhaul immigration laws.

A compromise bill that would have given illegal immigrants a chance for citizenship stalled in the U.S. Senate Friday as Congress began a two-week recess.

In Chicago, where an estimated 100,000 people marched through downtown last month in one of the largest of dozens of recent pro-immigrant rallies, no mass demonstrations are planned for Monday. Instead, organizers will use the day to gather steam for another downtown march planned for May 1--May Day--meant to emphasize the historical contribution of immigrants to the nation's economy.

The May 1 march will go past Haymarket Square, site of the 1886 Haymarket riot in the fight for the eight-hour workday, and end inside Daley Plaza, said Joshua Hoyt, executive director of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights.

It's not going to be as big as last month's march, Hoyt predicted, "but it's going to be as spirited."

Although no work stoppages are planned for Chicago on Monday, Hoyt said, "we're conscious that many workers and students are not going to go to work or school," in solidarity with events in other cities.

A vigil is planned in the largely Hispanic Pilsen neighborhood in support of Catholic priests who have been waging a hunger strike in opposition to punitive immigration measures.