13 Arrested in Protest Over Amnesty Law

As hundreds of hopeful illegal aliens lined up alongside the Federal Building downtown for amnesty applications, about 75 picketers protested the new immigration law and a small band of Latino activists chained themselves to each other and to a gate to call attention to what they see as the dark side of the bill.

“It’s a sad Cinco de Mayo for the undocumented community,” said Father Gregory Boyle of the Dolores Mission Catholic Church in East Los Angeles as federal officers, aided by Los Angeles police, handcuffed and arrested him and 12 other protesters for blocking the gate of the wire loading “cage” many illegal aliens pass through as they are deported.

“The American people feel the new law is a dream come true. They don’t know that it will separate families,” Boyle said before he was led away. “We want people to qualify for the new program, but we want it to be expanded to keep families together, to give people more time (to qualify) and the opportunity to work.”

The 13 demonstrators, who included a 71-year-old Latino woman, clergymen, attorneys and representatives of such groups as the Los Angeles Center for Law and Justice, Coalition for Visas and Rights of the Undocumented, Central American Network, Salvadoran and Guatemalan Assn. and Projecto Pastoral, were cited for trespassing, ordered to appear in federal court June 3 and released from the Police Department central station.

The protesters said theirs was a peaceful, symbolic act aimed at calling attention to the rights of the undocumented and to denounce a law which they said has already forced many to return to their own countries and will mean the deportation of many others.

In brief statements in English and Spanish, as their colleagues sang, “Just like a tree that’s standing by the water, we shall not be moved,” they predicted firings of Latino workers, increased discrimination, further exploitation of illegal aliens by employers and landlords, and the tragic separation of families in situations where one member qualifies for amnesty but others do not.

“With or without documents, we are workers and we have rights,” shouted Javier Rodriguez of the Coalition for Visas and Rights of the Undocumented as police loaded him into a van.

The demonstration lasted only 15 minutes and went unnoticed by the families who had come seeking amnesty, prepared for the long, hot wait with folding chairs and picnic coolers.

People carrying signs and banners reading “Human Rights for All Immigrants and Refugees” and “Simpson-Rodino es un Fraude” marched in front of the main entrance for another hour, chanting in Spanish, “Down with the Simpson-Rodino law” and “Jobs, yes, the Immigration no.” They could barely be heard above the Cinco de Mayo music blaring from nearby loudspeakers.