For Immediate Release // Excuse Cross-Posting
Contact: B. Loewe, NDLON, 773.791.4668, bloewe@ndlon.org
Hispanic Caucus Gala to be Target of Protest by Immigrant Communities Over President’s Continued Deportations
Instead of Hosting the President, the CHC Should Be Representing its
Constituency and Demanding Immediate Relief
What: Picket line demanding deferred action and immediate relief from deportation
Where: Congressional Hispanic Caucus Gala, Walter E. Washington Convention Center, 801 Mt. Vernon Place, NW
When: Thursday October 2 | 6:00pm–7:00pm
Who: National Day Laborer Organizing Network, Workers United of Washington, DC, #Not1More Campaign
Washington, DC—Immigrant communities are noting a contradiction in this week’s Hispanic Heritage celebratory gala hosted by the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and the guest of honor at the event, President Obama, who recently announced he would delay executive action and deport another estimated 60,000 people while his Party campaigns for reelection in the midterms. For this reason immigrant communities will protest continued deportations at the CHC’s gala on October 2 at 6:00 PM.
“We want action before, not after the election. There is no excuse for the President to delay reforming a deportation policy that he himself described as inhumane, and there is certainly no excuse for the Congressional Hispanic Caucus to accept a new protracted timeline. It appears the President is still relying on terrible political and legal when it comes to his deportation policy, and it is up to the Congressional Hispanic Caucus to tell him to take action immediately. Our message is this: if the President walks into a room full of Latino leaders, he will be met with protest, not acquiescence,” explains Salvador G. Sarmiento of the National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON).
The CHC has recently been under fire for acquiescing to the President’s new timeline in a response statement released nearly two weeks after the President went back on his commitment to take action before Summer’s end. Rather than the CHC, the strongest response to the President’s delay came from a group of 42 Congressional Democrats who sent a letter to the President saying that it was necessary for him to meet directly with persons in deportation proceedings.
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