US: Millions of immigrant workers join May 1st “boycott”

The nationwide protest movement—dubbed “a day without immigrants”—shut down stores, meatpacking plants, restaurants, construction sites and other businesses and halted work in the fields in many agricultural areas.

Slogans such as “we are not terrorists or criminals, we are workers” were widespread on many of the marches.

While in some areas, the turnout was reportedly lighter because of fears generated by recent factory raids conducted by immigration agents, in a number of major cities—Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Denver—massive crowds, in some cases ranging in the hundreds of thousands, demonstrated. The protests were conducted in defiance of warnings by President George Bush and other politicians—as well as by some leaders of Hispanic lobbying groups—against the boycott.

The protests were characterized by militancy and determination to fight for full citizenship rights for all. Many of those present denounced the efforts of politicians to use immigrant workers as scapegoats. However, the various Democratic politicians, church officials and union bureaucrats who spoke from the official platforms offered no way forward to defeat the anti-immigrant measures being prepared in Washington. On the contrary they sought to boost illusions in the false perspective of pressuring the Democrats to defend immigrant rights.

In not a few cases, employers lent at least tacit support to the movement, agreeing to shut down operations for the day. Tyson Foods, the world’s largest meat producer, for example, closed five of its nine beef plants and four of its six pork plants. Eight out of 14 Perdue chicken plants also shut down. Gallo Wines in Sonoma, California gave its workers the day off. And in a number of areas, supermarkets, restaurants and retail stores closed their doors.

Clearly, a significant section of both big and small business is seeking some means of regularizing the status of their work force. The American Chamber of Commerce has been one of the strongest lobbies for Congress to pass some form of immigration reform. The threat of a police-state style crackdown against undocumented workers—not to mention threats of legal sanctions against employers for hiring them—are seen by large sections of America’s ruling elite as a disruption of profit-making enterprises dependent on cheap immigrant labor.

At the same time, however, substantial elements of the Republican Party as well as some Democrats have attempted to whip up anti-immigrant sentiments as a means of dividing the working class and diverting popular anger over declining living standards and deteriorating conditions of life for immigrant and native-born workers alike.

It is this political contradiction that has thus far made it impossible for the Congress as a whole to pass immigration reform legislation. The only measure to be approved thus far is the “border security” bill passed in the House of Representatives, which would turn tens of millions of undocumented workers into criminal felons, while walling off the border with Mexico.

Read More
http://wsws.org/articles/2006/may2006/immi-m02.shtml