Progress Illinois

Demonstrating for comprehensive immigration reform and "respect and justice for all workers," thousands gathered today at Chicago's Union Park in celebration of International Worker's Day. On what turned out to be a beautiful afternoon, May Day participants marched downtown peacefully, waving flags and beating drums as they cried out for the humane treatment of immigrants.

The Change to Win unions were well represented, including workers from SEIU, UNITE-HERE, the Teamsters, and UFCW. Young people made up a huge chunk of the crowd and were often times the most enthusiastic, continually leading chants of "Education, Not Deportation!" and "Si Se Puede!" Alderman Toni Foulkes (15th Ward), herself a veteran union steward, riled up the crowd before their journey as well.

It was clear that this generation of immigrants, like those that built the skyscrapers towering over their heads today, just want to be acknowledged and compensated fairly for their contributions to American life.

More pictures after the jump.

Two dozen would-be citizens convened outside the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (CIS) office in Chicago yesterday hoping to raise awareness about backlogs in citizenship approval that are keeping them from participating in civic life.

According to Chicago Public Radio, CIS received a record 1.4 million naturalization applications nationwide last year, many of which arrived before fees rose dramatically in August. In fact, the agency saw a 350 percent increase in applications in June and July 2007 over the same period the previous year. Given the glut, many of the applications are still awaiting approval. But not in Chicago, says the Chicago District Director Marilou Cabrera, who addressed the crowd. She claims Chicago's office had no backlogs and processing is averaging eight-and-half months when the applications aren’t complex.

Two elderly immigrants with personal experience disagreed. One of the women, who has lived in the country for 50 years and would like to ensure her citizenship so she can cast a ballot in the 2008 elections, says she's been waiting since July to hear a final verdict.

Image courtesy of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights.

Over 100 new citizens joined the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (ICIRR) in Springfield today to lobby for immigrants rights. The group spent much of the day meeting with lawmakers and pushing for increased funding for both English language programs and citizenship transition programs. ICIRR executive director Joshua Hoyt said the group also hoped to draw attention to the Access to Religious Ministry Act (HB 2747).

"[It] is one bill that we have proposed in order to help people who are in detention," said Hoyt. He explained that the bill would "oblige counties that have turned the detention of immigrants into a business to allow religious workers to go visit immigrants in those jails."

The freshly-minted American citizens who traveled to Springfield included immigrants from all over the world. According to Hoyt, such diversity strengthens their cause.

"We have a big contingent of Polish people here today, a big contingent of Korean immigrants, and big contingent of Latino immigrants," said Hoyt. "They go and talk to their legislators and they deliver different groups of legislators. Some of the issues affect some groups more than others, but each of the groups clearly needs the others."

State Reps. Greg Harris (D-Chicago) and Edward Acevedo (D-Chicago) were among those who welcomed the group, and ICIRR says that today marks the beginning of a major voter mobilization drive for the November election.

"We are going to be working in 20 communities -- ten suburbs and ten cities -- this November on voter mobilization," said Hoyt. "Since 2004 we’ve registered 57 thousand people. We take this stuff very seriously."

For more information on ICIRR click here.

Image courtesy of ICIRR.

Over at Illinois Issues, Daniel Vock has a great run-down of the state's progressive accomplishments on immigrant rights. As statehouses across the nation ramp up their nativist rhetoric and strip undocumented immigrants of rights and benefits, Vock shows how Illinois residents and legislators have bucked the trend:

But even if lawmakers scale back the workplace law, Illinois remains one of the friendliest states for immigrants, legal or unauthorized. It’s opened doors to universities and doctors’ offices for children in the country illegally, and it’s made a concerted effort to help legal immigrants become citizens since 1995 [...]

In education, Illinois is one of 10 states that offers graduates of its high schools in-state tuition regardless of their immigration status. North Carolina lawmakers are considering whether to let unauthorized immigrants enroll in community college, which they were banned from doing until late last year.

As Colorado forbids spending on most public benefits for illegal immigrants, Illinois offers insurance to all children, including the undocumented, under its All Kids plan.

Vock points to several factors contributing to the state's strong support of immigrants, including a long history of immigration, Democratic control of state government, and lawmakers' ability to embed immigrant rights policies in universal plans. But most importantly, he cites the organizing of immigrants as a political force. This was a key factor in Bill Foster's victory in the 14th Congressional District special election, as Joshua Hoyt explained in a recent Progress Illinois column:

Dozens of Latino and immigrant activists were working to “Get Out The Vote” for Foster on Election Day and it is well worth noting that Foster carried the heavily Hispanic City of Aurora with a 3,200 vote margin.

Vock also unintentionally highlights an interesting tension in the GOP, both statewide and nationally.

(More after the jump ...)