Promise AZ to Join National Day of Action in Support of Comprehensive Immigration Reform

(Featured Photo: Facebook/Promise Arizona)

(PHOENIX) Local immigrants, families and allies will rally, march and conduct a prayer vigil on Saturday, January 14, in support of comprehensive reform and against the immigration proposals of president-elect Donald J. Trump.

“This day will serve to lift up the dignity, humanity and resistance of our communities and focus on bringing us together,” said Claudia Faudoa, an organizer with Promise Arizona who is coordinating the local event, called Stepping Stones to Community Power: Defend, Protect and Resist.

Faudoa said Saturday’s event will feature three main components:

• 4 to 6 p.m., St. Matthew Church, 320 N. 20^th Drive, Phoenix, AZ: an expert panel featuring U.S. Customs and Immigration Services Community Relations Director Juan Moran, who will discuss the citizenship process; Delia Salvatierra and Rafael Tirado, immigration attorneys, discussing immigrants rights and how to prepare for the incoming presidential administration; Promise Arizona Executive Director Petra Falcon, who will talk about the need to work in support of comprehensive immigration reform and keeping immigrant families together; and a representative of the Mexican Consulate’s Office on services available to Mexicans living in the United States.
• 6 p.m.: Promise Arizona’s team will hold a procession from St. Matthew Church to the Arizona State Capitol. The procession will be led by a local PAZ Cantina food truck, owned by Michael Reyes, a supporter an ally of the state’s immigrant community.
• 6:15 to 8 p.m.: Multi-faith prayer and vigil in support of immigrants rights on the grounds of the Arizona State Capitol.

“Promise Arizona has spent the past six years fighting against anti-immigrant laws and working tirelessly to protect the rights of our families and their children, and we are determined to step up our efforts in the coming months and years,” said Falcon. “We have fought these battles before and won, and we will win again.”

Faudoa said Promise Arizona workers and volunteers delivered postcards from immigrant families to the state legislators on the first day of the 53^rd Session of the Arizona Legislature to encourage them to avoid proposing state-based laws that might impact immigrants.

“We took the messages from our families to the representatives to remind them that we are contributing to this community,” said Faudoa, “we are not going away, and we will not give up our fight to improve the lives of all immigrants in Arizona.”

Promise Arizona also rallied along with more than 40 Arizona groups as part of Monday’s gathering at the Capitol organized by the United Against Hate Coalition in support of an inclusive and progressive agenda among Arizona legislators and Gov. Doug Ducey that rejects the hate-filled, anti-immigrant agenda of the incoming Trump administration.

The Phoenix event this week is part of a national effort led by Center for Community Change, United We Dream, SEIU, CASA, and Voces de la Frontera. Events will be held in more than 50 locations across the country, including Washington, D.C., to build momentum to prevent deportations, preserve the DACA program (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), and create sanctuaries of safety and deportation defense networks in cities, schools, churches and states.

The Washington, D.C. rally will be held outside the Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church (1518 M St NW) and will include a speech from Congressman Luis Gutierrez.

According to Cristina Jimenez, Executive Director & Co-Founder of United We Dream, “President-elect Donald Trump’s mass deportation plan to separate family and loved ones has generated fear throughout the immigrant community, but we will not hide in the shadows. On January 14, in nearly 50 locations, we will stand united to call on our country and our leaders to protect immigrants and refugees from deportation; to call for sanctuary and safety; and to call on our entire community to join the fight to protect our neighbors. January 14 will be the first show of our power, but it will not be the last. We will stand together to oppose the Trump regime and protect our communities.”

Kica Matos, Director of Immigrant Rights and Racial Justice of Center for Community Change, said “On January 14, we want every Senator and every Member of Congress to see us and to hear our words, and we want President elect Trump to understand the might, the resiliency and the power of our immigrant families and the immigrant rights movement. We’ll lift the voices of immigrant and refugee leaders of all backgrounds and affirm our shared values around Unity, Love, Resistance, Defense and Sanctuary.  We’ll not only pronounce our shared commitment to protect and defend immigrant families from attack — but we’ll also launch our movement’s demands of this new administration, which include respect for the civil rights and dignity for the recipients of DACA, for undocumented immigrant families, for refugees at risk, and for Muslim families.”