Immigration Action Decried

A sense of disappointment and betrayal swept through Southern California’s Central American community on Friday in response to Congress’ rejection of a proposal to grant immigration relief to hundreds of thousands of El Salvadorans, Guatemalans and Hondurans.

“We’re extremely disappointed and even angry,” said Angela Sanbrano, executive director of the Central American Resource Center in Los Angeles. “It’s too bad that politics was put before justice.”

Carlos Ardon, executive director of the Assn. of Salvadorans of Los Angeles, said: “It’s sad. We have been betrayed.”

The two were among the community activists and residents who gathered Friday in front of the Federal Building in downtown Los Angeles to vent frustration at Thursday’s immigration compromise by the lame-duck Congress. Missing from the package was a hoped-for provision that would have given permanent-residency status to hundreds of thousands from Central America and Haiti, sparing them the threat of deportation.

The setback was the latest chapter in a legal saga that began when large numbers of Central Americans started arriving in the United States in the late 1970s, fleeing civil war and poverty. Advocates have waged a campaign in Congress and the courts to let them stay here. But many remain in legal limbo.

Governments in Central America--dependent on billions of dollars sent back home annually by the immigrants-- have urged Washington to grant legal status to the expatriate masses. President Clinton vowed to fight for that goal.

But Republican leaders in Congress assailed the Clinton administration’s relief plan for Central Americans as too broad.

Many Central American immigrants heard the news of the immigration deal on Spanish-language television and radio.

“I was hoping something would happen, that I could get a work permit, but I guess they decided not to help us,” said Victor Hugo Perez, a 37-year-old factory worker from Guatemala who passed by the rally.

Southern California is home to more than 500,000 Central Americans, the nation’s largest enclave, according to community estimates. Many have temporary working permits. Most have been living here five years or more. Many have U.S.-born children--and have no intention of returning to homelands that lack opportunity, leaders say.

The Clinton administration favored a proposal that, according to estimates, would have resulted in legal status for more than 300,000 nationals of El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and Haiti nationwide who arrived in the United States by Dec. 1, 1995. That was the same date used in an amnesty that Congress granted to Nicaraguans and Cubans in a 1997 law. Citing that law, advocates framed their battle as a quest for “parity.”

But parity backers could never overcome the political considerations and a distinct Cold War sentiment that many blamed for the disparate treatment.

Nicaraguans and Cubans generally fled left-wing regimes hostile to Washington. And both of those groups are concentrated in South Florida, where Republican congressional representatives championed their cause.

By contrast, Salvadorans, Guatemalans and Hondurans escaped from right-wing governments friendly to the United States. Democrats in California and elsewhere could not muster support across the political aisle.