More Immigration Protests On Tap Monday In Texas

DALLAS (AP) – Marches, rallies and protests were scheduled across Texas on Monday calling for Congress to legalize an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants.

In Dallas, where Sunday’s march drew between 350,000 and 500,000 people, activists were urging immigrants to showcase their spending power by not buying anything during an economic boycott.

Rallies were planned Monday in Houston, El Paso, Austin and elsewhere in Texas and the U.S. They were held in smaller cities as well, including an estimated 2,000 protesters at a morning rally in Tyler.

On Sunday in Dallas, the largest of many marches around the nation, the crowd waved American flags as it snaked through downtown. Marchers shouted “Si Se Puede!”, Spanish for “Yes, we can!”, as they made their way to Dallas City Hall, where Hispanic leaders urged them to vote and press lawmakers to pass laws to help undocumented immigrants.

“This is a force, an energy here,” said Amir Krummell, a U.S. citizen born in Panama. “There has to be a deal … there has to be a happy medium.” They carried signs that read “Justice and Dignity for all U.S. immigrants,” “Help us Re-unite Families” and “The Undocumented are not tax exempt.”

The Sunday rallies also drew counter-demonstrators, and more were expected Monday. Police in Dallas said there was no violence. Marchers included families pushing strollers with their children and ice cream vendors who placed American flags on their carts.

Labor groups, some employers and religious organizations also supported the rally. Some protesters wore shirts that said “No HR 4437,” referring to the House bill passed in December that would build more walls along the U.S.-Mexico border, criminalize helping undocumented immigrants and make it a felony, rather than a civil infraction, to be in the country illegally.

Opponents of the House legislation included business owner Michael Longcrier, who carried a sign that read “We work because of hard working immigrants.” An overhaul of immigration law is stalled in Congress.

But activists say the Senate’s decision last week not to push a bill that would have given many illegal immigrants a chance at citizenship offers them a chance to regroup.

The protests have been supported by popular Spanish-language disc jockeys, who quickly merged their local events into national plans after hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated in dozens of cities last month, culminating March 25 with a 500,000-strong rally in Los Angeles.

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(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

AP-NY-04-10-06 1108EDT