Immigration debate riles Latinos

Carolyn Hileman - The Voice | April 23, 2008 

U.S.-born Latinos in America are fed up. They’re tired of the ugliness in the immigration debate, and they’re not buying the argument that it does not concern them.

Take it from Janet Murguia, president of the National Council of La Raza, the nation’s largest Hispanic civil rights organization. She recently delivered a passionate and important speech to the National Press Club in Washington. Her topic: the immigration debate and what she labels a wave of hate sweeping the land — one that isn’t limited to illegal immigrants, or even immigrants in general, but which is now splattering onto all Hispanics regardless of where they were born, what language they speak or what flag they wave.

“Most Latinos aren’t immigrants,” she said. “More than 80 percent of Hispanics in this country are U.S. citizens or legal residents. But the truth is, Hispanics understand that this issue is about all of us.”

That’s obvious. You might live in Colorado or New Mexico or Arizona and come from a family that has lived in the United States for several generations. And yet, your citizenship is being challenged by nativists who paint with a broad brush. All they see is your skin color or surname and, from this, they conclude that — unless you go along with every harebrained scheme to combat illegal immigration — you’re, as one reader recently informed me, “an American in name only.”


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