Portland continues the fight for immigrant rights

Portland, OR – On Sunday, March 23, Portlanders rallied at Terry Schrunk Plaza to reject the Trump administration’s mass deportations and demand legalization for all undocumented immigrants in the United States. The assembled crowd was 100 strong and was made up of people of all ages.

Sky Reimer, a member of Students for a Democratic Society at Portland State University (SDS) spoke on the need for solidarity between the student, anti-war and immigrant rights movements, citing ICE’s detainment of Palestinian student activists Mahmoud Khalil and Leqaa Kordia. Reimer. They said, “These racist policies of our universities aren’t just happening at Columbia, they are happening countrywide.” Reimer later said, “By getting into the streets to protest Trump’s agenda, we prove that the people hold the power, that we hold the power.”

Cass Cano of Portland Contra las Deportaciones (PDXCD) brought up the paper-thin justifications used by ICE to detain and deport immigrants, including incredibly broad definitions of gang affiliation tattoos. Over 200 Venezuelan immigrants were recently detained by ICE and moved to an El Salvadorian prison with a history of human rights abuses. These immigrants were not given due process. “The cruelty is the point,” Cano explained.

Holly Brown of the Freedom Road Socialist Organization (FRSO) declared, “The so-called ‘war on immigration’ is nothing more than a war on the working class. It is a war designed to keep people in constant fear – fear of deportation, fear of detention, fear of separation from families. It is designed to create a permanent underclass of workers who can be exploited without the full rights and protections that should belong to every human being, no matter where they were born!”

After the speeches, the crowd took to the streets and marched through downtown Portland, chanting, “No ban, no wall, legalize them all!” and “No fear, no hate, no ICE in our state!” Bystanders voiced their solidarity as the march went by, and some joined along.

This protest came one month after another pro-immigrant march organized by many of the same groups, in which organizers were harassed by the Portland Police Bureau and fined over $2000 for traffic violations. The groups involved are still in the process of fighting these politically motivated fines, and demand that the citations be dropped by Portland Mayor Keith Wilson and Police Chief Bob Day.

#PortlandOR #ImmigrantRights #PDXCD