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Immigration Reform And Gay Rights: A Molotov Cocktail?

Claudia Meléndez Salinas |
June 4, 2009 | 6:05 p.m. PDT

Columnist
Claudia Melendez
Claudia Melendez

The bloggosphere is aflutter with the possibilities: this will be the year of immigration reform, declares Senate Majority Leader Harry Read and the pundits go haywire.

Reform Immigration for America, a national coalition of pro-legalization immigrant groups, launched their campaign this week in 40 cities with rallies, flags and speeches. The optimism is so bright, even my Oakleys can't protect my eyes.

But here come the clouds - two big ones, so gray and heavy with water they threaten to explode into a huge downpour any minute now.

From the realm of the usual suspects return NumbersUSA, FAIR, ALIPAC, Michelle Malkin and all the immigration party animals ready to start swinging at their favorite piñata. Fresh from a grassroots effort that prevented from passing a bill to give undocumented immigrants the right get a driver's license in Maine, NumbersUSA is undoubtedly gearing up for the next match. These groups are so strong, so well organized, that they're credited with derailing efforts to overhaul the nation's immigration system twice already - in 2006 and 2007.

The second, a new arrival in this already controversial party, has the potential to cause more harm. And unfortunately, it's a just, fair, and much needed amendment to our immigration laws. It's called the Uniting Americans Family Act, a bill that would allow U.S. citizens or legal residents to sponsor their same-sex partners to immigrate to this country. According to ImmigrationEquality.org, there are nearly 36,000 binational same-sex couples that could benefit from this type of legislation.

Sounds fair, doesn't it? Well, not to everyone. Rev. John C. Wester, Bishop of Salt Lake City, and chairman of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, told Congressman Mike Honda in a letter that the church would not support the House version of the family reunification act as long as it contained language that would give "marriage-like benefits to same-sex relationships."

Wanna watch anything more explosive than immigration and gay rights in this country? Try putting them together. Why don't we throw in something about abortion while we're at it? Already, the Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, leader of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, who apparently did not take well to this recent appearance of gay rights in the immigration party, described this new development a "slap in the face to those of us who have fought for years for immigration reform," as quoted in Politico.Com.

These are fighting words. If there is an ally the immigration reform movement can't absolutely dispense with is the faith-based community.  Regardless of people's beliefs, it is the moral authority of religious orders that lends credibility to pleas for immigration reform, and in fact it is their more visible presence of late that has pushed its momentum. In fact, Lutheran Minister Alexia Salvatierra, the executive director of Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice of California, has said that immigration reform will not get approved without the support of white evangelicals. Rev. Rodriguez split with white evangelicals in their support for the Republican Party precisely because of their immigration agenda, and look where that got the GOP.

This is not only scary, but it has the potential of getting pretty ugly. There are perhaps no more dedicated bunches than the anti-immigrant and anti-gay rights groups. Put them together in a unified cause and Holy Bulldozer. And if the clergy abandons the movement, it's all over.

Perhaps there's no reason to worry. After all, the gay rights community has tremendous organizing prowess and their presence in an immigration reform package could be an asset and not a liability.

Then I look at Proposition 8 in California - the voter-approved measure to ban same-sex marriages - and I'm not so sure.



 

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