The same day North Carolinian William Gheen, president of the virulently anti-immigrant organization ALIPAC, called on Congress to abandon the Constitution and subvert the 2010 Census data to crack down on undocumented immigrants in his relentless crusade against "the alien invasion," four courageous young immigrant students were making their way through North Carolina on their 1,500 mile walk from Miami, Florida, to Washington, D.C.
Felipe Matos, 23, Gaby Pacheco, 25, Carlos Roa, 22, and Juan Rodriguez, 20, decided that life in the shadows without a chance for a meaningful future was no longer tolerable. They saw their friends and schoolmates lose hope, drop out of school, sink into depression and turn to self-destructive behavior, including suicide. How can these young people believe in themselves if the country they call home does not believe in them or their future? So the four students decided that they had to break the silence and come out of the shadows themselves, risking detention and deportation, to raise awareness about the unbearable plight of undocumented youth in our nation. Thus the Trail of Dreams was born.
http://www.trail2010.org/
"We have the same hopes and dreams as other young people, and have worked hard to excel in school and contribute to our communities. But because of our immigration status, we’ve spent our childhoods in fear and hiding, unable to achieve our full potential.
We walk for our dreams, and the dreams of millions of others that currently live in the shadows -- in a state of hopelessness, and paralyzing fear. We walk the Trail of Dreams in the spirit of nonviolence and peaceful dialog. We walk to tell our stories to the world, so we can engage each other in a fruitful conversation to stop the suffering by keeping our families together and our dreams alive.
We walk in order to call on our leaders to fix the system that forces people like us into the shadows, stripping us of the opportunity to participate meaningfully in society."
http://www.youtube.com/...
The four dreamers started walking on January 1 and plan to reach Washington on May 1 to urge President Barack Obama and members of Congress to pass the DREAM Act, which would offer a path to permanent residency for young undocumented immigrants who were brought to the U.S. by their parents. The act would allow those who came to the U.S. before the age of 16 and who have lived here for at least five years and graduated from high school or received a GED to get temporary residency for six years while they enroll in higher education or serve in the military for two years. After those six years, they can apply for permanent residency and work towards eventually becoming citizens. It's a long and difficult journey, but it offers these students a chance to have a real future.
http://www.flickr.com/...
Not surprisingly, the four students have encountered many anti-immigrant reactions along the way. In Nahunta, Georgia, the Ku Klux Klan, in full regalia with white hoods and all, organized an anti-immigrant rally under the premise that "God put each race in their respective continent and they were meant to stay there." The Klan did not care to explain how that squared with their ancestors leaving their continent and settling here though. The Dream Walkers stood their ground, but they were not alone. The NAACP and local supporters stood shoulder to shoulder with the young immigrants.
http://www.trail2010.org/...
In Greensboro, NC, the four Dream Walkers visited the Civil Rights Museum and Center. Gaby writes movingly of the experience:
http://www.trail2010.org/...
It happened here, over 50 years ago, where a spark of justice inspired 4 individuals to publicly condemn the oppression and suffering felt in the city. Divided and segregated by Jim Crow laws, Greensboro saw the first direct and intentional action within the civil rights movement through their sit-in at the lunch counter in Woolworth’s store. It started here, in this city, enveloped in a rich cultural mosaic of people, places and things that intertwines a harsh past of struggle and hardship with the present beauty and glow of a booming metropolis. We walked those streets, seeing a mixture of characters, a beautiful tapestry of people, brothers and sisters, in the freedom land.
A bell rings. In my head I hear: Thank God Almighty, we are free at last. But are we?
The "warm and fuzzies" are purged from my body. I stop and re-ground myself. It’s a bittersweet moment to realize the nature by which we accept this concept of "freedom" in a country priding itself in justice and equality for all.
For all?
This concept eludes my consciousness because I can hardly fathom what this would mean to me, in a society where freedom could pervade. I DREAM with my eyes open. I stop looking at the picture that looked back at me for an instant. I had traveled the city just then, in my head. I do this, from time to time, to escape to a place, where only I can feel at peace.
I see Felipe cry and I think of his pain internalized by this feeling of hatred that this country felt towards our African American brothers; this hatred reigns rampant today as folks have found a new scapegoat in a day and age where lessons should have been learned from the past.
He feels it. They feel it. I feel it.
A flash of the word "IMMIGRANT" goes off in my head.
I feel the tears run down my cheeks uncontrollably as I try to hold back these feelings of sadness and hopelessness. I breathe.
I pinch myself, just then, to make sure I’m there. I only affirm to myself that I am real, that I am human.
As a young girl, I felt discriminated for my skin color. I was called racial slurs and names because I was brown. I was ashamed of my parents for who they were and who they came to represent in the eyes and minds of those around me.
Words flicker in my mind:
Dirty dogs. Illegals. Alien. Colored. Slaves. Segregation.
These words mean so much then and now.
I cry again...
The support, acceptance and love the four students received in the communities through which they walked far outweighed the occasional encounters with hatred and prejudice. For every one person who questioned their humanity, there were hundreds who welcomed them into their communities, their homes and their hearts, and in true Southern tradition, that solidarity translated into mountains of food. Juan told me that despite walking 15 miles every day, he has gained nine pounds since leaving Miami.
"We are never hungry," he said with a smile. "Everybody thinks we need something to eat."
I had the great pleasure of sharing a meal with the Dream Walkers on Tuesday, April 6, in Raleigh, NC. The dinner was hosted by Uniting NC, a recently formed organization that brings together North Carolinians from all walks of life – business, community, faith, and all political affiliations - to tell their stories, celebrate shared values and recognize the great contributions new families bring to North Carolina’s communities.
http://unitingnc.org/
One of Uniting NC's actions includes putting up billboards across the state, from Beaufort County near the beach, to Charlotte in the middle, and Asheville in the mountains. You may have seen one on your way through our state:
http://unitingnc.org/...
The dinner was one of the many conversations about immigration that Uniting NC is planning to initiate across the state. Rather than shouting across what divides us from one another, the organization hopes to bridge the rift by encouraging people to tell their stories and listen to the stories of others with an open heart and mind. At the dinner, we were all asked to talk about how we came to this place at this time in our lives. Not surprisingly, most of us were from somewhere else and shared some highlights of our journeys with each other. It caused us to reflect more deeply about what means to call a particular state or country home.
I am an immigrant myself, having arrived as a young woman 37 years ago from Germany. I had my "green card" before I even set foot on US soil. No temporary status, no waiting, no problems. I did not appreciate how privileged I was at that time. I just took it for granted. I also took for granted that I could attend college and qualify for in-state tuition, that I could apply for the jobs I wanted and get hired based on my qualifications for doing the job, that I could get a driver’s license without a single question about my status, that I could live wherever I wanted and not be afraid of immigration raids, that I could raise my children in peace knowing we would never be torn apart because of a piece of paper.
I look at the four Dream Walkers, their faces lighting up with welcoming smiles as they share their journey with us, then turning serious as they talk about the struggle they have experienced or witnessed in their young lives, and I ponder the injustice of laws that allowed me, who did not grow up in this country, easy access to a higher education, meaningful employment, and citizenship while these students who were educated in this nation’s schools and were steeped in this nation’s culture and values and who consider themselves Americans since childhood have none of these rights in the very country that has been their home for most of their lives. These young people will be an important part of our communities and workforce for decades to come and, if given a chance now, will contribute so much more to the economic, cultural, social, political and spiritual life of our nation than even they can dream of today.
The failure of Congress to pass meaningful immigration reform has left hundreds of thousands of undocumented students in legal limbo, often without the possibility to further their education beyond high school and, therefore, significantly reducing their opportunities to contribute to the fullness of their potential to the communities they call home. For the United States to remain competitive in a globalized economy, it must nurture a knowledge-based workforce that has access to the education and training necessary to adapt to a constantly changing world economy.
Rather than raiding other countries of their educated citizens to fill the growing shortages in certain industries (for example, some estimate that by 2025, the nursing shortage could reach 250,000 with a 20% RN vacancy rate nationwide), let’s educate these young people who are already here and allow them to give back to the country they call home. The well-being of all of us may depend on their contribution.
Join Felipe, Gaby, Carlos, and Juan and millions of other Dreamers and call on President Obama and the US Congress to make it a top priority to pass comprehensive immigration reform on the model of H.R.4321, the Comprehensive Immigration Reform for America's Security and Prosperity Act of 2009 (CIR ASAP), that was introduced by Representative Luis Gutierrez. Let them know that we demand:
· humane immigration enforcement at the borders and in the interior;
· a steep reduction in the immigration backlogs to help speed up family reunification goals;
· a path for undocumented youth who entered the U.S. as children to adjust their status such as the DREAM Act provides;
· a realistic path to earned legal residency and eventual citizenship for immigrants in good standing already living and working in the US using a broad criterion of contribution to U.S. society through education, employment, military service, or community/volunteer service;
· increased funding for ESL classes in public schools, community colleges and community-based adult English literacy programs as well as tax incentives for teachers pursuing ESL certification and employers who provide adult English literacy and basic education programs to their workers;
· a means for bi-national LGBT couples to petition for each other as delineated in the Uniting American Families Act (UAFA) initiative;
· an improved immigration process for future immigrant workers that does not create the kind of permanent underclass of workers a guest worker program would produce;
· a moratorium on ICE raids on the workplaces and homes of immigrants;
· the shelving of E-verify programs for further review;
· an end to the criminalization of immigrants for misdemeanors;
· the repeal of 287(g) and Secure Communities programs and similar memorandums of understanding between local law enforcement and Homeland Security and the implementation of rigorous restrictions on joint ventures to limit detention and deportation efforts to the removal of dangerous criminals who pose a real threat to the community;
· an overhaul of immigration detention center practices to provide oversight and transparency to ensure that the human rights and human needs of detainees are protected at all times and that grievances will be addressed promptly and effectively;
· community-based alternatives to detention facilities, especially for families with children;
· effective and rigorous sanctions against employers who profit from exploiting immigrant workers by outright wage theft; failing to pay a livable wage or pay overtime; refusing to comply with occupational and health standards; failing to carry workman’s compensation insurance or offering medical benefits if hurt on the job; excluding immigrant workers from receiving pensions, health insurance, and other benefits accorded non-immigrant employees;
· support for immigrant workers' rights to organize into unions to protect their rights as established by the International Labor Organization (ILO) and sanctions for corporations who deny these rights.
Dreamers, continue to walk your hope out loud and with each step create the very ground where your dreams can take root and grow and change not just your lives, but ours as well. We, as a nation, need to come out of the shadows too, the shadows of fear, prejudice, hate and self-centeredness and honor our heritage as a nation of immigrants by embracing our shared humanity and the gifts our new neighbors bring.
Walk on, Dreamers everywhere. You are not alone. Mr. Gheen and his minions cling to a consciousness that belongs in the past. The future belongs to you, Dream Walkers. It has been an honor to meet you. I will always remember you with love and gratitude and admiration. And I will continue to work for comprehensive immigration reform with you as my inspiration.
Felipe, Gaby, Carlos and Juan are spending their last night in North Carolina and will cross into Virginia tomorrow. Go to their website and sign up to walk with them.
http://www.trail2010.org/...