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Immigration reports

Editorial Chronicles of quandaries and soul searches

My 18-year-old son Marco had just returned home from a weekend with mom in Tucson.

"How was the trip?" I asked.

"Good," he half-mumbled in the stoic mode patented by teen-agers.

"Anything exciting happen?" I prompted, as fathers do.

"Got stopped by La Migra again driving back to Phoenix."

"Say more."

"They got behind me just before the rest stop, so I pulled in because I knew they were going to roust me. They just checked my ID and let me go."

My son is tall, slim, and very brown. At 18 he is the hard-working manager of a fast food restaurant in Phoenix. He is the fourth generation of Hernandez men in the United States, from origins in Mexico.

Marco is among the reasons Latino Perspectives Magazine is publishing a two-part, special report on America’s intensifying debate on illegal immigrants. The timing was prompted by the sometimes bitter negotiations in Congress to reform dilapidated federal immigration policies.

A Pew Hispanic Center study estimates there are 11.2 million undocumented immigrants and their families living in the U.S. The rest are citizen Latinos, some now in their fifth and sixth generations. Some Latino families have been
living in Arizona since it was still Mexico.

Ropes tossed by a government to corral the undocumented have the ominous potential to snare citizen Latinos. The legislation now being forged in faraway Washington, D.C. may have negative, unintended consequences on the daily lives of Arizona Latinos.

Another reason is that Arizona − our home − is the beta lab for the benefits and hardships pressed on our systems of law enforcement, education, health and others by undocumented immigrants. As such, it is also the testing ground for local solutions that could be applied nationally. Our state Legislature also is the petri dish for festering bad answers to immigration reform.

Most important, we examine this very complex issue through Latino eyes, minds and hearts. We sought the opinions of citizen Latinos from many walks of life. Using intensive interviewing techniques, our goal was to learn not only what Latino citizens were thinking, but also what they were feeling.

We found viewpoints about the impact on our society of undocumented immigrants run the gamut from love, to hate, to indifference.

Most Latinos interviewed were in a quandary about how they thought or felt. Some said they deferred to an unspecified federal "leadership" to deal with the dilemma. Others argued that personal direct actions were the only way for Latinos to weigh in on potential solutions. Some wanted to be quoted anonymously or refused to have their photo taken because they’d lose their jobs or suffer other repercussions for voicing an opinion. Some say they preferred just to ignore the entire situation, hoping it would go away on its own.

In Part I of Latino Perspectives’ special report we publish vignettes that tell of Latinos’ confusion, resentments, sympathies, conflicts, racism fears and their soulful searches within to discover the roots of their individual stands on immigration reform.

We also look at the new dynamics developing because of the marches on March 24 and April 10. Have the marches galvanized the Latino community to participate actively in forging immigration reform? And will this newfound activism go dormant after legislation is passed?

In Part II (June edition) of Latino Perspectives’ special report on immigration, we analyze the role of Latino leadership in immigration
reform. We report the stories of Latinos involved in crafting immigration solutions or pathways to reform compromises.

America − and Arizona − is changing. I witnessed this at Antonio’s eatery on Indian School Road and 17th Street on a recent weekend morning. At one corner table, two White construction workers talked in distinctive Southern drawls. Nearby a Latino couple conversed in English in low tones. In the booth behind them two brown construction workers chatted in Spanish. Piolín por la Mañana, a hugely popular radio program on a local Spanish station, suddenly deviated from its typical banda music and played God Bless America by LeAnn Rimes.

All the diners paused, silenced by America’s moving, unofficial anthem, united by the emotions of gratitude and pride.