Immigrant rights coalition exposes Lou Dobbs’ racism

“Hey, Lou, we don’t support you!
Stop immigrant bashing!”

TWU Local 100’s Charles Jenkins and AFSCME Local 375’s Mike Gimbel show support of NYC labor for immigrant workers. WW photo: John Catalinotto

On July 14, during the evening rush hour outside CNN headquarters at the Time Warner building in Manhattan, this chant could be heard as over one hundred members and supporters of the May 1 Coalition held a spirited picket line against Lou Dobbs’s relentless racist attacks on immigrants.

The protest was organized to denounce the bigoted diatribes of this right-wing talk show host, whose xenophobic “news” program poisons the political atmosphere against immigrants across the country.

Dobbs’ “message of hatred is to divide the people,” said Sharon Black of the coalition. “Dobbs speaks to the middle class in the United States saying that immigrants take away work and benefits from U.S. workers, and that is a lie.”

Black’s statements along with comments from coalition leader, Larry Holmes and Lenin Medina of El Poder Latino, an Ecuadorian group, were published in El Diario, a popular New York-based Spanish language newspaper. “We are tired of CNN and Lou Dobbs converting their programming to a racist campaign against immigrants,” said Holmes.

Berna Ellorin from Bayan-USA spoke about the hundreds of thousands of Fili pin@ workers who have fled poverty in their homeland and are working for starvation wages in the United States. Mexi cans who have risked their lives to work here have been vilified by Dobbs, the representative from Asociacion Tepeyac noted.

May 1 Coalition leader, Chris Silvera, who is secretary-treasurer of Teamsters Local 808 and chair of the Teamsters National Black Caucus, denounced Dobbs as an agent of the corporations which have impoverished Third World nations, noting that “free trade” has “restructured” the world economy to make profits for big business. This capitalist restructuring has forced immigrants to leave home to seek work in the U.S. “Dobbs creates disunity among U.S. workers,” Silvera said.

Charles Jenkins of Local 100 of the Transport Workers Union called for solidarity between Black and immigrant workers against corporate greed.

A speaker from Pakistan USA Free dom Forum described Lou Dobbs’ role in gaining support for the U.S government’s deportation of tens of thousands of Pakistani immigrant workers whom the U.S. government called “terrorists.”

Chuck Mohan, president of the Guyanese-American Workers United said, “CNN gives the world the incorrect idea about immigrants in this country” as immigrants and U.S.-born workers walking by cheered.

Ignacio Jaureguilorda from Argentina said, “Those who live in this country should support those who come to this country and who don’t have rights to protect them.”

Ecuadorian immigrant leader Lenin Medina added, “We are opposed to [Dobbs’] racist attacks. It is not the moment to speak of races in a country where we are all of mixed races.”

A letter delivered to Dobbs by Teresa Gutiérrez of the May 1 Coalition said in part, “We stand in solidarity with all immigrants and demand full legalization and full rights for all. We believe that no worker is illegal. … Immigrants do not close factories, lay off workers and send shops abroad in search of cheaper labor, deny health care to the people of this country [or] raise the cost of gas to exorbitant costs.”

Dobbs responded to the protest on his July 14 show alleging that Venezuela and Cuba were “fueling this nation’s illegal immigration crisis.” He praised the mayor of Hazleton, Pa., who Dobbs claimed was, “leading the way ... with an ordinance with harsh penalties for hiring or renting property to illegal aliens.”

Bayan-USA said, “No media personality has done more to generate an anti-immigrant climate than CNN’s Lou Dobbs.”