Last month, in a church in Chicago’s Humbolt Park neighborhood, Rep. Luis Gutierrez began laying the groundwork for the upcoming battle to usher comprehensive immigration reform through the new Congress.

Gutierrez told a standing-room-only crowd that by heading to the polls last November, they’d helped turn the political tide. But unless immigrants kept the pressure on, there would be no guaranteed end to the repressive immigration policies that continue to tear families apart.

“If [elected officials] look to their left and look to their right and they see millions of people organized … it’s easier to get things done,” he told Progress Illinois at the rally. Today, folks across the state are heeding Gutierrez’ advice and ratcheting up political pressure just as he sharpens his message.

On the South Side of Chicago, a coalition of immigrant rights groups will walk a nine-mile stretch from Little Village to Camp Hope in Hyde Park where an Immigrants Day rally is planned for this evening. And as President-elect Obama’s nominee for Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano, heads into her Senate confirmation hearing, the Illinois Coalition for Immigrants and Refugee Rights (ICIRR) is adding their voice to the call for a moratorium on raids and deportations, arguing instead for “smart enforcement” of immigration laws. From a press release:

ICIRR urges Gov. Napolitano to push for just and humane immigration reform that brings immigrants within the law, offers opportunities for safe future migration, protects all workers, and helps immigrants integrate into American society [...]

The federal government should focus on real criminals and effective protection of our nation instead of continuing to terrorize hardworking immigrants and their families and tearing communities apart.

We caught up with ICIRR’s executive director Josh Hoyt who tells us that he’s not expecting Congress to move on comprehensive immigration reform (which would include a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants) until early next fall. In the meantime, he wants to see a quick end to raids and deportations. And on January 21, he’ll be on hand for a post-inaugural demonstration at the front door of the Department of Homeland Security to get that message across.

“I expect that the new administration will start engaging in smarter enforcement,” Hoyt says. “But until new folks come in and change things, [raids and deportations] are the policy … What needs to happen, immediately, is that we need to stop separating families.”