Opposing groups sharpen message for looming border battle

Orange County Register (California)
September 6, 2009 Sunday
By CINDY CARCAMO

With President Obama indicating he'll tackle comprehensive immigration changes, organizations are gearing up for what promises to be another hard-fought debate. The challenge will be for influential groups to look past the rancor and invective.

Former schoolteacher Evelyn Miller doesn't plan to retire from the anti-illegal immigration movement any time soon.

She's too busy organizing petitions blasting e-mails, faxes and letters and threatening politicians who are up for reelection.

The 76-year-old member of the California Coalition for Immigration Reform says she is driven by her belief that those in the country illegally are taking jobs and taxpayer services from Americans.

"We're soldiers in the foxhole," Miller said from her dining room in Irvine, which doubles as a home office.

Groups such as Miller's have proven so effective in mobilizing and delivering their message that they have halted two attempts at sweeping immigration changes.

In 2007, the groups shut down the Senate's phone system at the height of discussion on changes that would have given millions without legal status a pathway to citizenship.

Now, with President Barack Obama's recent announcement of renewed efforts to work with Congress on legislation, groups on both sides in Orange County and across the nation say they are energized and ready for the next battle. Some immigrant advocates say they've learned from the last round in the ring.

"We've had several years of the anti-immigration side making a lot of noise and able to organize themselves very effectively and contacting members of Congress," said National Immigration Forum spokesman Douglas Rivlin.

Groups that promote immigration changes are now more organized and building stronger alliances, he said. They are mobilizing young people, labor unions and even church leaders to carry their message and using social-networking tools more than before.

The message? An overhaul, they say, is the only way to fix a broken immigration system. The only reasonable solutions are to legalize the millions who are in the country illegally and provide a guest worker program, they add.

Matias, an activist who lives in Placentia and who is in the country illegally, said he and other activists are encouraging young people to reach out to lawmakers.

"A lot of times youth become active, and they are more worried about putting a rally together or getting media attention, and they don't necessarily think about contacting their legislator, and now they are making sure we have all our bases covered," he said.

The Orange County Register is withholding Matias' full name at his request and under newspaper policy that recognizes the potential for retaliation against him.

In Orange County, the birthplace of Jim Gilchrist's Minuteman Project and ballot initiative Proposition 187, those who would like to restrict illegal immigration are already skilled in the art of getting out their message.

"Our direct e-mail list is well over 500 people, but beyond that a good many of our direct e-mail lists are group leaders of other groups throughout the nation. It could get up to the thousands," said Barbara Coe, founder of California Coalition for Immigration Reform.

The anti-illegal immigration group based in Huntington Beach co-authored Proposition 187 nearly 15 years ago. The initiative would have denied public services such as education to people in the country illegally. Voters passed the proposition, but a federal court overturned it.

Some of the people who pushed that initiative are still at it.

"That was what helped us defeat the amnesty of 2007. It was just a constant barrage of messages: 'If you vote yes on this, you'll lose my vote and financial support.' That was nonstop," Coe said. "And we're making the effort to do exactly the same thing."

Some in the immigrant advocacy movement say the political dynamic helped defeat an immigration overhaul. By the time President George W. Bush got around to pushing the bill, he was unpopular and didn't even have political sway in his own party, they say.

Now, Obama is promising to work to provide a "pathway to citizenship" for people in the country illegally. In addition, he's expressed the need for a temporary work program for people to come to the country legally and the enforcement of immigration laws already on the books.

Finding ways to mobilize supporters is now a priority for the pro-immigration overhaul groups, Rivlin said.

On June 1, activists kicked off the Reform Immigration for America campaign, which serves as an umbrella for various organizations - including labor unions, law enforcement and religious groups.

Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, which is heading the campaign's efforts, said the various groups were simply unprepared the last time around. Now, he said, they have a database list of about 75,000.

Reaching out to youth is an important component in the push for change, Matias said.

He and his allies are promoting the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, or DREAM Act, which would give students in the country illegally a pathway to citizenship. They use social-networking tools, such as Facebook, Twitter and their Web sites to organize rallies throughout the nation. On June 23, they held mock graduations in Orange County and about a dozen other places throughout the country, the largest in Washington, D.C.

"I'm here in California ... but I can contact people all over the country who are coming together," he said. "We all have a shared experience ... coming up with immigration reform. It affects us a lot and personally."

The Rev. Alexia Salvatierra, a Lutheran pastor in Los Angeles, travels to Orange County regularly, setting up meetings with religious leaders from immigrant and nonimmigrant congregations.

She's serving as a liaison to help create understanding between the groups.

Orange County immigration advocates who were active in 2007 reached out to religious leaders in immigrant communities, said Salvatierra, who oversees the Orange County chapter of Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice.

"It was very clear that was not effective by itself," said Salvatierra, who is also executive director for the organization's California chapter.

She said it's her hope that a common biblical belief in compassion will give nonimmigrant religious leaders and congregation members a new perspective on immigrants - especially those who are in the country illegally.

In Orange County, 10 congregations, including megachurch The Crossing Church in Costa Mesa, have already committed to informal meetings with pastors who lead immigrant churches, such as Templo Calvario in Santa Ana.

"Orange County has a very rich county of people of faith who are serious about their faith," Salvatierra said. "If your faith is biblically based, it's not easy to ignore the Scripture about welcoming thy neighbor, loving thy enemy."

Some anti-illegal immigration activists have been watching the heated town halls on health care legislation and see the future.

"I think that what you're seeing at the health care town halls may be a template for the immigration debate," said Tara Setmayer, who handles immigration policy for Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-Huntington Beach. "I think it may be a template for the grass-roots advocates who have been so involved and vocal in the past."

But Minuteman founder Jim Gilchrist said he doesn't hold much hope for the movement, especially from what's left of his group after years of infighting.

"The Minuteman movement has lost its mojo because of all this delusional mentality that has gotten into the movement. ... In our side of the argument, they are all attacking each other," Gilchrist said, alluding to his legal wrangling with Coe and other former allies - some of whom formed new groups.

The slow disintegration of the Minutemen, he says, mirrors the movement in general.

"I think amnesty will pass," he said.

949-553-2906 or ccarcamo@ocregister.com

Matias, a graduate of UCLA who does not want his last name used because he is an undocumented immigrant, works with social-networking media like Facebook and Twitter to reach out to activists and shape the immigration debate.

Evelyn Miller, 76, of the California Coalition for Immigration Reform works out of her dining room.

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