Annual march for immigrant rights demands change this year
Photos and story by Giles Clasen
After speaking at the Ya Es Hora: March for Citizenship on Saturday, September 25, Rey Salvidrez Rodriguez said he is beginning to feel hope again.
More than 100 immigration rights advocates participating in the annual event marched along Speer Blvd from Viking Park in North Denver to Auraria Campus. Many of those who attended the march have had their lives profoundly impacted by the current U.S. immigration law.
As a DACA recipient, Rodriguez was unable to attend his grandfather’s funeral in Mexico two years ago. The rules of DACA, a renewable deferral to deportation first implemented by President Barack Obama, do not permit him to leave the United States under most circumstances.
Rodriguez watched his siblings, who are citizens, pack and leave for the funeral. In that moment, he said, he lost hope. He had lived as a DACA recipient for half of his life but began to wonder if he would ever be allowed to become a U.S .citizen.
He considered giving up his life in the United States to travel and see his grandfather one more time, Rodriguez told those gathered at the event.
“My heart shattered into millions of pieces that day, until now,” Rodriguez said. “I feel that a piece of my heart is still missing.”
But Rodriguez is beginning to feel hopeful again.
“Right now, we have the Democratic Party in control,” Rodriguez said. “We have the best opportunity to pass immigration reform in my lifetime. Those politicians ran and were elected on a promise. Now is the time to hold them to it.”
This sentiment was held by many who attended the march.
Democrats had hoped to pass a pathway to citizenship for eight million undocumented individuals as part of their budget reconciliation package, currently moving through congress.
Passing a bill through the senate via budget reconciliation requires only a simple majority and protects the bill from a Republican filibuster.
But the Parliamentarian, Elizabeth MacDonough, advised against the measure because the scope of the action was greater than its budgetary impact.
The recommendation by the Parliamentarian should not be seen as a complete roadblock to passing immigration reform via reconciliation according to the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition (CIRC).
“The Parliamentarian’s recommendation is just that a recommendation,” Bianey Bermudez, communications coordinator for CIRC, said in an email. “It’s important that we hold our representatives accountable for the promises they ran and won elections on. We’ve been waiting for a pathway to citizenship for decades now; we can’t wait any longer.”
Rodriguez is working on his master’s degree in higher education at CU Denver. His education pursuits have been interrupted at times because he is not able to utilize school loans, and many scholarships have a citizenship requirement.
He said being a DACA recipient doesn’t make life easy. He must renew his participation in the program every two years and renew his work permit once approved. This process costs him $495 each time. Rodriguez said he even lost a job because the renewal process took too long, and his work permit expired.
Rodriguez has worked as a janitor and landscaper, saving money to finish first his bachelor’s degree and now his master’s degree. He hopes to work in education upon finishing his degree.
He was elected to student government and won the CU Rosa Parks Diversity Award.
Rodriguez considers himself fortunate to have DACA and has worked hard to accomplish what he has. But he worries about his career opportunities because there is a stigma in hiring in many professions for individuals who aren’t citizens.
Rodriguez isn’t the only participant at the march who has renewed hope that immigration reform can get passed.
Pedro participated in his twelfth march the weekend of September 25. Like Rodriguez, Pedro was unable to attend funerals, when his sister and father died in Mexico because of immigration law.
Pedro, who didn’t give his last name for legal reasons, said his mother first moved to the United States in 1985. He was 15 at the time, and the best chance his family had financially was for her to move north and send money back to Mexico.
“We didn’t have enough money to survive in Mexico. She came here to give us a better life,” Pedro said.
Pedro was raised by his grandparents and migrated to the United States in 1998 to be near his mother, who had received citizenship. He expected to obtain citizenship, too, with his mother as a sponsor.
Pedro was working with a lawyer to get his citizenship when Sept. 11, 2001, upended everything. The path to citizenship became more difficult.
“I have been waiting for 20 years to become a legal resident,” Pedro said with a hoarse voice after chanting at the march.
His family has been separated for decades because of U.S. immigration law. He said he cringes when individuals say immigrants are bad people or bad for the country.
“I’m a medical assistant, I help a lot of people,” Pedro said. “[Immigrants] work hard. We pay taxes, also. I pay a lot of taxes. We rent a house, buy from local stores…. We do a lot of things to help grow this beautiful country.”
Pedro has spent half of his life in the United States and said he feels like an American despite the law saying he isn’t.
“It is a game,” he said. “Politicians just play with our dreams; they just play with our hope. They just play with us.”
Pedro said he will continue to march each year until reform laws are passed. He said at times he has felt hopeless, but not this year.
Those who work with CIRC hope the march in Denver can put pressure on elected officials to help bring reform.
“This is different than past marches because we actually have actions and people in power that can make this happen,” Bianey Bermudez said. “We want to bring attention to what’s happening and the fact that there is a plan to get a pathway to citizenship right now, the only way they will move that along is if the people show support and continue to mobilize.”
Monica Perez, a DACA participant who spoke at the march, thinks something else is changing that will make it harder to ignore the demands for immigration reform.
“Telling people you are undocumented is still – you don’t want to tell that with anyone,” Perez said. “But we are starting to share this story. Every single person knows someone who is undocumented.”
Perez, who has attended immigration rights marches since she was very young, works full time and attends community college full time in Colorado Springs. She said many undocumented individuals don’t have the option of pursuing education beyond high school because of the unique financial burdens.
“As an immigrant, we feel we need to be there for our parents because they sacrificed for us so much,” Perez said. “Sometimes that can mean going into the workforce rather than school to help the family out.”
Perez said the stress of being undocumented weighs on her almost daily even though she has DACA. Her brother was detained by ICE and held at the Aurora detention center for six months. He was arrested by ICE after attending a court hearing for a minor infraction in Colorado Springs.
The laws aren’t the only thing that makes life hard as a migrant Perez said.
She finds it hard to make connections with individuals who don’t understand what her life has been like as an undocumented individual and DACA participant.
Even worse, is the overt racism she said she experiences regularly.
“One of the things I remember the most was being at a gas station with my dad when I was young,” Perez said. “We were speaking Spanish. The woman next to us pumping gas started screaming at us to go back to Mexico.
“That was the first time I realized people don’t want us here.”
Whether wanted or not, Perez said she will keep fighting to change the laws and remove the stigma of being an immigrant.
Perez, like others, proclaims she is “undocumented and unafraid” on her social media accounts. She believes as the stigma of being undocumented lifts, the laws will be easier to pass.
“We have people who are coming out,” Perez said. “There is bigger support from the younger generation. They are out here marching with us. We are joining the older generation who has been doing this for years and it is creating a louder voice. I think it is giving us so much more influence now.”