nytimes.com
Immigrants’ Rallies Draw Small Crowds in Flu Scare
By JULIA PRESTON and KIRK SEMPLE


At a May Day rally in Los Angeles, dozens of marchers took precautions against the spread of swine flu. Turnout at immigration marches there and in many cities was lower than expected.

Immigrants turned out for May Day demonstrations across the country in much smaller numbers than last year, with marchers pointing to uneasiness about the flu scare and job worries in the recession to explain why many people stayed home.

Organizers had called for marches and rallies as a show of support for immigration overhaul legislation that President Obama has said he will offer before the end of the year. But in Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami and New York, among other cities, turnout was sharply lower than expected as immigrants, many of them from Mexico, said they did not feel the time was right for marching in the street.

Mexican immigrants and businesses in the nation have not seen major negative impacts from the rapidly spreading flu epidemic, despite wide publicity that the illness first erupted in Mexico and has spread from there. But in New York, a major annual Cinco de Mayo festival was canceled because of fears of flu contagion.

And Mexicans around the country said the fallout from the swine flu had arrived in more subtle ways, from remarks that struck them as prejudicial, to friends who declined dinner invitations without giving a reason.

In Boston, Jay Severin, a conservative radio talk show host on WTKK-FM who is known for outrageous banter, was suspended indefinitely from his afternoon show after he referred to Mexican immigrants in insulting terms, executives at the station said Friday. In comments about the flu epidemic in recent days, Mr. Severin had called Mexicans “primitives,â€