Chicago immigration activists ready Washington push

Chicago immigration activists ready Washington push
By Antonio Olivo
Copyright © 2007, Chicago Tribune
Published March 5, 2007, 8:35 PM CST

As Congress prepares to renew its debate over federal immigration reform, Chicago activists plan to blitz lawmakers with phone calls and bus caravans to Washington in hopes of winning more rights for legal and undocumented immigrants.

The $450,000 Illinois Is Home campaign will also focus on promoting state reforms, such as allowing undocumented immigrants to qualify for driver's licenses, said Juan Salgado, president of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, during a news conference Monday.

The campaign will join other immigrant mobilization efforts already under way, as the likelihood increases for passage of some kind of federal legislation, organizers said.

On Saturday, a rally is planned downtown, at Federal Plaza, on the anniversary of the first of several marches last year that brought the immigration issue to the fore for many Chicagoans.

"It's important to work in concert," said Salgado, who helped coordinate those marches. "The obvious next step is to come out and be a part of the work that's happening to move votes in our congressional delegation."

That effort will include phone banks and a three-day trip to Washington next week, where participants will present Illinois' 21 members of Congress with a list of immigration reforms they'd like to see passed, organizers said.

At the end of March, a similar lobbying trip is scheduled for Springfield.

Leaders of the campaign plan to use ethnic media and the Internet to pull volunteers into their effort, while counting on sympathetic legislators to spread the word.

Billy Lawless, president of Celts for Immigration Reform, said the campaign would partially focus on the economic contributions immigrants have made to cities like Chicago. With the debate over immigration again heating up after dying in Congress last year, there is a sense of urgency behind the effort, he said.

"This is going to be our year" for some kind of reform, he said. "But we have to fight for it."

aolivo@tribune.com