ARIZONA REPUBLIC April 10, 2006 Migrant issue divides Latinos Dissenting voices drowned out by pro-immigrant rallies Daniel González
The Arizona Republic
Scenes of hundreds of thousands of Latinos marching nationwide to support immigration reform have helped promote the perception that Hispanics are united on the issue.
In reality, a sizable number of Latinos opposes the marches, strongly objects to allowing undocumented immigrants in the United States to earn citizenship, and wants the government to clamp down on illegal immigration.
Their voices, however, have been largely muffled by the massive protests, obscuring the divisions that exist among the nation's 40 million Latinos in the midst of a monumental debate over the status of the 11 million to 12 million undocumented immigrants in the United States. And today, in a gigantic show of support, an estimated 50,000 to 100,000 demonstrators in Phoenix will join hundreds of thousands around the country to rally for immigrant rights.
"That's the objective of the marches. To give the impression that all Latinos are for allowing the illegals to become citizens. Well, I'm not," Phoenix resident Lionel De La Rosa said.
Born in Texas, the 71-year-old Vietnam veteran favors punitive measures more in line with the immigration bill passed by the House in December that would have made being in the United States illegally a felony.
"I'm for that 100 percent," he said. "As far as my Latino friends are concerned, they all agree on this."
Giving credence to De La Rosa's stance are surveys that suggest that many U.S.-born Latinos, especially the middle class and middle-aged, support immigration but don't like illegal immigration.
Gabriel Escobar, assistant director of the Pew Hispanic Center, a nonpartisan research organization in Washington, D.C., said there are significant political differences among Latinos.
"In general, there is this perception of the Latino community as being monolithic, when the reality is otherwise," Escobar said. Immigration prism Though views such as De La Rosa's are common among Latinos, they are rarely reflected among Latino leaders, said Steven Camarota, research director at the Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington, D.C. think tank that favors greater restrictions on immigration.
"It's easy to tap into the views of the intellectual class, but harder to tap into the views of the common folks," he said.
What's more, Latinos who favor greater restrictions on immigration are often reluctant to speak out because so much of the debate over illegal immigration comes off as anti-Hispanic.
"That's extremely off-putting," Camarota said. "Whatever their views, they keep it to themselves."
Instead, the divisions among Hispanics over immigration are more likely to surface in conversations between family members, or among co-workers, said Ron Hoyos, 43, an information technology specialist who favors reducing the flow of illegal immigration.
"Having some control on the border is probably not a bad idea," said Hoyos, whose father came to the United States from Mexico.
Hoyos, however, said he opposes legislation that would turn undocumented immigrants already here into felons.
Though many Latinos have negative views of undocumented immigrants, they are often hesitant to express them openly out of fear of being ostracized, said Phoenix resident Frank Barrios, 64.
"There are a lot of Hispanics that are upset about the undocumented just the same way as the Anglo population. That group is larger than many people would believe," said Barrios, vice president of the Phoenix Museum of History's board of directors.
"But a lot of Latinos aren't going to brag about it because they feel they will be criticized."
Barrios, a third-generation Mexican-American who traces his family's roots in Arizona to the 1870s, said it's hard to pigeonhole Latinos' views on immigration.
"I'm very sympathetic to the immigrant cause and I go way back and I know others who have only been here one generation and they are very strongly against undocumented immigrants," Barrios said.
But Camarota at the Center for Immigration Studies said Latinos with the strongest views against undocumented immigrants tend to be those who directly compete with them in the job market, or live in neighborhoods with large numbers of immigrants.
In some Phoenix neighborhoods, recent Latino immigrants have clashed with longtime Hispanic residents over lifestyles and education and housing opportunities. In some cases, city officials have been asked to mediate disagreements or enforce neighborhood ordinances. U.S.-born Latinos The 50,000 to 100,000 who organizers expect to march today in Phoenix is part of a nationwide effort to keep pressure on Congress to pass immigration legislation that would allow undocumented immigrants in the United States to earn legal status and, eventually, citizenship.
"People will take a snapshot of these marches and draw conclusions that this is representative of the Hispanic community in the entire country," said Escobar, of the Pew Hispanic Center.
But a significant minority of Latinos has views closer to the rest of the U.S. population and expresses concern about illegal immigration and its effect on the economy, Escobar said. A 2005 survey by the Pew Hispanic Center found that Latinos in general have favorable attitudes toward immigrants and immigration. But when it comes to illegal immigration, significant numbers have negative views of undocumented immigrants. Those feelings are strongest among middle-class and middle-age U.S.-born Latinos, the survey found.
For instance, though a majority of Latinos, 68 percent, said they believe undocumented immigrants help the economy by providing low-cost labor, nearly a quarter felt undocumented immigrants hurt the economy by driving down wages.
U.S.-born Latinos looked even less favorably toward undocumented immigrants than foreign-born Latinos. More than a third of U.S.-born Latinos said undocumented immigrants hurt the economy, compared with just 15 percent of foreign-born Latinos who felt the same way.
The survey also found that Latinos are divided over whether to allow undocumented immigrants to earn citizenship.
Though an overwhelming majority, 88 percent, of foreign-born Latinos favored allowing undocumented immigrants to earn citizenship, a smaller number of U.S.-born Latinos, 78 percent, said undocumented immigrants should be allowed to do so.
Meanwhile, south Phoenix resident Elsie Orta has no plans to participate in today's march in Phoenix.
"Other Hispanics have told me to go to the demonstrations," said Orta, 55, who said her mother is from New Mexico and her father's family traces its roots to Spain. "I think it's hurting them. They're making a fool of themselves."
The Phoenix native believes Arizona is under siege by undocumented immigrants who speak Spanish, use public services and take jobs away from citizens. Undocumented immigrants, she said, should be deported.
"They want us to cater to them all the time," she said. "They're coming over here, they're taking our jobs. And now, everything has to be in English and Spanish? I don't think so. They need to go back." |