Immigrants Rally Against Welfare Cuts

Many fought alongside the CIA in the jungles of Laos. Others fled Russia to avoid religious persecution. And others made the long trek from poverty-stricken states in southern Mexico to work in el norte.

They came to the United States in different ways and for different reasons, but Tuesday more than 2,000 of them converged on the state capital to protest welfare reforms that affect immigrants more than any other group.

Chattering in half a dozen languages, some were wizened and stooped with age, while others wore military fatigues, a reminder of their service as allies in Vietnam.

On their shoulders they carried placards with a variety of messages such as “I rescued your son in the jungles of Laos, Now what?” and “Paid the price, 40,000 Hmong dead for America.” But their protest had a single underlying theme: They expected state government to restore the safety net that Congress had pulled away.

In groups, they visited legislative offices, and a small contingent pushed its way into Gov. Pete Wilson’s outer office pleading for a face-to-face encounter with the chief executive. But they had to settle for a meeting with the press liaison for his community relations office.

“We want the state to fill the gap where the federal government abandoned us,” said Renee Saucedo, executive director of the Coalition for Immigrant Rights and one of the organizers of the protest. “We want everyone in Sacramento to see that immigrants care about what happens to them.”

Under the new federal welfare law enacted in August 1996, an estimated 243,000 legal immigrants in California and 500,000 nationwide by late summer will lose Supplemental Security Income, which provides cash benefits to the aged, blind and disabled. An additional 300,000 are expected to lose food stamps as cuts begin to go into effect next month.

As the time draws closer, immigrant groups have increasingly put pressure on state government, urging lawmakers and the governor to provide the benefits that Congress is taking away from them.

They used Tuesday’s peaceful protest, the biggest by far, to press their demands that the state create a food and nutrition program for those who will lose food stamps and establish assistance for those who will lose their SSI payments.

The answer they got from many state officials was not what they wanted, but it showed increasing sympathy for their plight.

Wilson’s press secretary, Sean Walsh, said last week during a visit to Washington that the governor had pleaded with several congressmen to restore benefits to the most severely disabled and elderly who have no other means of support and are incapable of moving through the citizenship process. An estimated 40,000 to 50,000 could be affected.

“We have empathy for the people who are here today,” Walsh said.

Although the governor was willing to plead with federal officials to restore benefits to some, Walsh said the state could not afford to spend the hundreds of millions it would cost to make up for all the federal cuts.

In a letter to California’s congressional delegation, Assembly Republican leader Curt Pringle (R-Garden Grove), a supporter of the new welfare law, also urged that more legal immigrants be exempted from the cuts, particularly those who are severely disabled.