At NYC May Day rally, calls for a more liberal immigration reform bill

Protesters hold up signs criticizing the current immigration reform bill on May 1, 2013 in New York City. (Goo …

One might imagine that activists at the pro-immigrant, pro-labor May Day rally in New York City would be happy about the bipartisan immigration reform bill currently in the Senate. But signs and activists at Wednesday's rally called the current draft bill an "unjust" plan that will leave out too many immigrants in its legalization scheme and focus too much on increased enforcement at the border.

One popular sign at the rally featured the face of Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-New York, behind barbed wire. The words: "No to Schumer and the Gang of 8," in Spanish—referring to the eight senators who hashed out the plan.

Activists said the immigration compromise—which trades stricter enforcement of current laws for a 13-year path to citizenship for most of the nation's 11 million unauthorized immigrants—is unjust and unacceptable.

The rally was part of 85 May Day demonstrations taking place in Los Angeles, Chicago, Phoenix and other cities pushing for immigration reform and labor rights. They drew thousands of protesters, according to organizers.

"I speak for most immigrants when I say the gang of 8 is doing a bill that will give us almost nothing," said Carlos Canales, a community organizer from Freehold, N.J. "It's going to end up to be an elitist immigration reform."

Canales said he's organizing a hunger strike in front of Schumer's New York office in the coming weeks to urge him to change the bill to address criticisms from the left. Canales objects to the requirement that immigrants who want to be legalized must prove they've been employed since December of 2011 to qualify. He said many unauthorized immigrants will have trouble proving employment because they work in more transitory jobs that don't keep records.

A Schumer spokesman, Max Young, said the bill has drawn "wide support among prominent Latino and pro-immigration organizations." And an organizer of the May Day rallies, Ben Monterroso, stressed that "there's so many good things in the bill," even if activists have some concerns.

"Senator Schumer is working with the length and breadth of the Hispanic community to pass an immigration bill that accelerates family reunification and that sets a path to citizenship that gets all eligible 11 million people out of the shadows and into legal status as quickly as possible," said Young.

Other activists at the rally said they object to the way the bill will shift the legal immigration system to prioritize skill- and employment-based visas. Under the current proposal, visas for adult siblings of U.S. citizens will be eliminated, and a cut-off age for applying for green cards for adult children will be instituted.

Christina Chang, an advocacy associate for the Korean American group Minkwon Center for Community Action, said she does not believe the current bill is unjust, but that she hopes it changes substantially in the coming weeks. "It's a fundamental change from a family-based immigration system to one that's merit based," Chang said.

Her group also believes that immigrants could end up waiting 20 years or longer to become citizens under the bill, if lawmakers continue to make the process contingent on the U.S.-Mexico border meeting certain security standards.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to hold a hearing on the bill May 9. Advocates believe it will be introduced on the Senate floor by May 25.

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Thousands rally at Capitol for immigrant citizenship

By Ian Simpson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Thousands of supporters of immigration reform rallied around the Capitol on Wednesday, calling on lawmakers to support a path to citizenship for an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants.

Demonstrators waved flags, from the United States and in smaller numbers Latin American countries, and held signs reading "Citizenship for 11 million" and "Basta ya! La deportacion," which translates to "Deportation, enough already."

The National Rally for Citizenship in Washington D.C. took place a day after negotiators in the U.S. Senate said they were putting the finishing touches on an immigration reform bill that would likely be completed in their chamber this week.

Immigration reform has gathered strength in Congress following President Barack Obama's re-election in November. Hispanics, the fastest-growing voter bloc, heavily favored Democrats over Republicans in the elections.

Republicans have since started to get behind immigration reform, an effort that had been mainly embraced by Democrats.

"Together we educate, rally, pray and knock on doors until a comprehensive immigration reform bill arrives at the desk of President Obama," Gustavo Torres, president of immigration advocacy group CASA in Action, told the crowd on the Capitol's west lawn. "You are the movement that will win immigration reform."

Activists said they wanted to ensure that any new law contained a mechanism to allow people currently in the country without documents to obtain U.S. citizenship. They do not want it tied to border security or other legislative objectives.

Ivan Gomes, a 37-year-old used car dealer, traveled from Kalamazoo, Michigan to attend the rally.

"We're here to send a message so that our voices can be heard and that something is going to happen," Gomes said as he waited in a long line to get into the Russell Senate Office before the rally.

"It's not just about politics," said Gomes. A native of Borneo, Gomes has lived in the United States for 13 years, but so far has been unable to get citizenship. "It's about people's daily lives. We're having families torn apart."

The rally of about 100 organizations is sponsored by immigration reform groups and unions, including the United Auto Workers and the Service Employees International Union.

La Santa Cecilia, a Los Angeles band that specializes in Latino fusion, revved up the crowd with their song "El Hielo,". Spanish for "ice," about the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arm of the Department of Homeland Security.

The crowd spilled over the boundaries of the wide West Lawn of the Capitol and across nearby streets. Onlookers clung to the base of the statue of Ulysses Grant, one of the world's biggest bronze structures.

TRACTION IN CONGRESS

Immigration legislation in the Democrat-controlled U.S. Senate will include an earned pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, bolstered border security and ways for business to meet the need for both high-skilled and low-skilled workers.

A bipartisan group from the Republican-led House of Representatives is working on its own version of a bill that also includes ways to earn citizenship.

Inside the Russell Building before the rally, protesters packed the Senate Agriculture Committee room to urge Michigan Senators Debbie Stabenow and Carl Levin, both Democrats, to back immigration reform.

The chandelier-lit room erupted into cheers and chants as the two senators said they backed reform.

"We want to make sure that there is a wage built in, a living wage rate," Stabenow said. She added that she wanted two paths to regularize farm workers: one for those that move from state to state for work and those that return to their countries of origin between jobs.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the biggest U.S. business group, and the AFL-CIO, the largest labor federation, reached an agreement on a guest-worker program in late March. The accord cleared the way for the writing of a full bill in Congress.

If the Senate and House bills pass their respective chambers, they would have to be reconciled before a final version is voted on and then sent to Obama for signing into law.

(Reporting by Ian Simpson and Rachelle Younglai; Editing by Scott Malone, Cynthia Johnston and Grant McCool)

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Opposition holds big rally in Venezuelan capital

By Andrew Cawthorne and Deisy Buitrago

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan acting President Nicolas Maduro said on Saturday a centuries-old curse would fall on the heads of those who do not vote for him in next week's election to pick a successor to late leader Hugo Chavez.

Maduro's invocation of the "curse of Macarapana" was the latest twist in an increasingly surreal fight between him and opposition leader Henrique Capriles for control of the South American OPEC nation of 29 million people.

"If anyone among the people votes against Nicolas Maduro, he is voting against himself, and the curse of Macarapana is falling on him," said Maduro, referring to the 16th century Battle of Macarapana when Spanish colonial fighters massacred local Indian forces.

Wearing a local indigenous hat at a rally in Amazonas state, a largely jungle territory on the borders of Brazil and Colombia, Maduro compared Capriles and the opposition coalition to the enslaving Spanish occupiers.

"If the bourgeoisie win, they are going to privatize health and education, they are going to take land from the Indians, the curse of Macarapana would come on you," he added.

CAPRILES SAYS ONLY CURSE IS GOVERNMENT

Calling himself the "son" of Chavez, Maduro has more than a 10-point lead in most polls, although Capriles supporters are predicting a late pro-opposition surge as sympathy wears off from the former president's death a month ago.

Capriles, 40, a state governor, says Venezuela needs a fresh start after 14 years of Chavez's hardline socialism, and is vowing to install a Brazilian-style administration of free-market economics with strong social policies.

He ridiculed Maduro's latest speech.

"Now in their desperation, they're threatening a curse on the people. The people are with God, so nothing like that will happen," he told a rally in the western state of Tachira.

"He (Maduro) lied and threatened the people, saying that if they trust in progress, a curse will fall on them. I tell you here, all Venezuelans, the real curse is that little group that we are going to get rid of on April 14."

The opposition leader also continued to mock Maduro's twice-told story of having seen the spirit of Chavez in a bird that flew over his head and sang to him last week.

While to some outsiders, talk of spirits and curses may seem absurd in an election campaign, Venezuela's mix of Catholic and animist beliefs, especially in the south-central plains and jungles, is fertile ground for such references.

In his daily campaign rallies, Maduro has been referring constantly to Chavez and playing a video where the former president endorses his protege last year as his successor.

Puncturing Capriles' public admiration of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Maduro has also been playing a video of the former Brazilian president endorsing him too.

At his rallies, Capriles mocks Maduro as a poor imitation of Chavez. He says Maduro's track record during the president's sickness from cancer and after his death has wrought disaster on Venezuelans in terms of a currency devaluation and price rises.

Maduro, 50, was a bus driver and union leader who rose to become Chavez's foreign minister and then vice president.

Venezuela's vote will decide not only the future of "Chavismo" socialism but control of the world's biggest oil reserves and economic aid to a handful of left-leaning nations in Latin America and the Caribbean from Cuba to Ecuador.

(Editing by Peter Cooney)

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