Rev. hosts anti-illegal immigration rally

[jimpasz]

http://www.nashvillecitypaper.com/index ... s_id=51680

Rev. hosts anti-illegal immigration rally
By Bill Harless, bharless@nashvillecitypaper.com
August 22, 2006

A popular radio talk show host who broadcasts weekdays on WVOL 1470 AM, a prominent local radio station that caters to the black community, is organizing his listeners to rally against illegal immigration at a demonstration he has scheduled for next month.



The Rev. T.J. Graham on the air at WVOL
Josh Anderson/The City Paper
A popular radio talk show host who broadcasts weekdays on WVOL 1470 AM, a prominent local radio station that caters to the black community, is organizing his listeners to rally against illegal immigration at a demonstration he has scheduled for next month.

The Rev. T.J. Graham, who pastors a small church in Bordeaux but whose weekday Open Forum radio show is becoming one of the station’s most popular, has organized a Sept. 9 rally at Legislative Plaza, a response to the pro-immigration rally held downtown May 1 to mark the “Day Without an Immigrant” when many Hispanic immigrants stayed home to demonstrate their importance to the American economy.

“We’re going to show our lawmakers that it’s not a federal problem. The problem is they’re on our streets, running over our people; they’re on our streets, they’re in our communities,” Graham said in an interview Monday. “We don’t mind legal people coming — you come legally, if you go through the right process, we have no problem with that.”

Graham expressed special concern about public safety: illegal immigrants enter the country without a heath screening, and their criminal backgrounds are unknown, he added, pointing to automobile accidents caused by illegal immigrants in Davidson County in recent months. He also expressed concern that illegal immigrants are stealing social security numbers in order to procure jobs in the United States.

The September rally is to show politicians “that we want them to start doing something about this illegal problem. We’re showing that the American people are against illegal immigrants.”
Graham emphasized that, to him, the matter is not one of race.

“I’m out to change this stereotype — I’m out to change the way we look at one another — we’re going to look at each other as Americans [without regard to race]. Period. Bottom line. And once we start to look at each other as Americans, we’ll start to do things for America. When you take pride in where you are and what you are, then you can solve a lot of problems.”

And although Graham said that race is not involved in the situation, a growing number of studies on the black attitude toward illegal immigration are being published. Indeed, the summer issue of the NAACP’s national magazine Crisis is devoted to the subject.

Also, a study the Pew Research Center published in April said that although twice as many blacks as whites in America say illegal immigrants should be eligible for social services (43 percent versus 20 percent), more blacks than whites say “they or a family member have lost a job, or not gotten a job, because an employer hired an immigrant worker” (22 percent versus 14 percent).

Rev. Enoch Fuzz, who also hosts a show on WVOL, said Monday he feels Graham is definitely touching a sentiment felt by African-Americans in Nashville, saying he believes Graham is focusing on how illegal immigrants supposedly depress wages.

He said he believes the sentiment is creating a “community-wide swell — I’m hearing that people are buying into that — that the illegal immigrants being here are keeping wages down for the average working American,” said Fuzz, saying he believes the concept is accurate.

Nevertheless, Bishop George W. Price Jr., president of the Nashville Interdenominational Ministerial Fellowship, said he does not believe the matter is so straightforward, admitting he is unfamiliar with Graham’s campaign and adding he has no problem with legal immigration.

“We’re saying that they’re taking jobs away from our community. That’s true. However, on the other side of that coin — to be really candid about it — those are [low-wage] jobs that our community doesn’t want to do anyway. So it’s a two-way street there. … So yeah we have a gripe and we don’t have gripe.”


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[Charlesoakisland]

We need to make sure that Rev. T.J. Graham has the ALIPAC web site.

[Charlesoakisland]

I just sent him an email via the radio station inviting him to join us here at ALIPAC.

[had_enuf]

Duplicate article. Posted earlier. Please watch the duplicates.

http://www.alipac.us/modules.php?name=F ... ic&t=33156

[ALIPAC]

If you can get his phone number, PM me. I would like to speak with him personally.

W

[Brian503a]

I posted a few articles on this guy several days ago and included a link to the radio station he broadcasts from. Maybe you can contact him through the station.

http://www.alipac.us/modules.php?name=F ... ic&t=38535

http://www.wvol1470.com/WVOL.htm

WVOL / The Mighty 147am
1320 BRICK CHURCH PIKE
NASHVILLE TENNESSEE 37207
Office (615) 226-0683
Fax (615) 226-0709 E-mail wvol1470@wvol1470.com