May 1 marks International Workers Day around the globe. Here in the U.S., immigrants’ rights coalitions called for a National Day Without An Immigrant, advocating no work, no school and no buying to show the impact that the immigrant community has. Millions of undocumented workers and their supporters took to the streets.

Throughout California, protests drew record numbers – 25,000 in Salinas, 15,000 in Sacramento and Oakland, 30,000 in San Francisco, 1000 in Union City and over 100,000 in San Jose, where small red flags with, “Fight Back!” on one side and, “¡Lucha y Resiste!” on the other were very popular.

More than 1 million marched in Los Angeles. Carlos Montes, a veteran leader of the Chicano national movement, said of the Los Angeles march, “This is a new era of struggle in the U.S., with the Chicano-Latino people’s fight for equality and self-determination. And we will keep the pressure on, with other types of actions and potentially an Immigrant Mother’s Day of solidarity and a Dump Arnold action in California. We will call for dumping racist politicians in the Nov. elections, linking the immigrant rights struggle to the anti-war movement.”

In San Jose the march was so huge that people were still leaving the starting point when the first marchers arrived at the end, more than four miles away. The protest was almost all Latino, with more Central and South Americans and Asians than the previous protest on April 10.

“I was impressed by the spirit of unity in the march. We carried a banner, “Asians for immigrant rights,” and were constantly getting smiles, whistles, thumbs-up and even a few clenched fists from the overwhelmingly Latino crowd,” said local community organizer Masao Suzuki.

Chants of, “Sí se puede!” (Yes, we can!) were mixed in with white t-shirts saying, “Un dia sin inmigrantes, May 1, 2006.” While U.S. and Mexican flags were most common, there were also others: Salvadoran, Chilean, Brazilian and even a few red flags and religious banners. Many of the smaller businesses along the route were closed that day, either in support of the economic boycott or because their workers did not show up for work.

In Asheville, North Carolina, a town of 70,000, 3500 people come out for immigrants’ rights, shutting down most of the streets in the downtown area for several hours. Many people walked out of their workplaces and students walked out of schools in the area. “There was a very high spirit of solidarity and unity and the demonstration was marked by a strong optimism that the people are winning in the fight against the racist Sensenbrenner legislation,” said local student organizer Kostas Harlan.

Danielle Fernez, one of the organizers of the Asheville protest, said, “I’m more full of pride than anything else. It’s about what you stand for. We can and want to fight together with you for a better community. We are not just fighting for us, but for every American, for every person, for the dignity and respect that all people deserve.” In the spirit of International Workers Day, chants like, “We are workers! We are workers!” as well as, “No somos criminales!” were popular.

And in Minneapolis, despite drizzling rain, 3000 immigrants and supporters came out for a community rally in a local park. “It was great to see so many immigrant families present at the event. It would be completely inhumane to separate them because one or both of the parents are undocumented. We will continue to fight until our rights and dignity as human beings are recognized,” declared one local immigrant student organizer. Speakers from the local Arab and African American communities talked about how the Latino struggle is linked to theirs and expressed solidarity with the Latinos.

Organizer William Martinez said of the Minneapolis rally, “On this day we are showing Congress and the politicians that immigrants are an economic and political power. We are here and we demand justice and equality, not just for Latinos, but for all immigrants in the United States. We not only support the U.S. economy, but we support the economies of two countries at once. One, through the remittances that we send to our countries of origin, and two, through the taxes that we pay here in the United States.”

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