Dallas protests for immigrant rights

Dallas, TX – On July 29, around 15 immigrant rights protesters gathered at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Dallas Field Office to protest harsh conditions undocumented migrants are being put through on the border. The protest comes shortly after reports were made from a whistleblower in Border Patrol about extremely cruel policies towards undocumented migrants ordered by the office of the governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, whose policy demands that migrants crossing the Rio Grande River into Texas be thrown back into the river, as well the construction of a barricade of buoys in the river that have razor wire on them, these buoys have resulted in the drowning or serious injury of many undocumented migrants, including children and a pregnant woman. 

The protest was called by La Frontera Nos Cruzó, and attended by members of Brown Berets Dallas, Malaya Movement Texas, National Alliance Against Racism and Political Repression – Dallas, and Freedom Road Socialist Organization.

Tony Rodriguez of the Dallas Brown Berets gave a speech condemning Greg Abbott’s racist policies, stating, “Today Abbott, I serve notice to you. Your days in power are limited, we will fight you on every street corner, in every workplace, and every campus we are on. You will meet resistance from the brown indigenous community. We have every right to be here.”

Syd Loving, co-chair of the National Alliance Against Racism and Political Repression expressed solidarity with the fight for the rights of migrants, and linked the struggle by migrants to the struggle against police brutality by African Americans. “The same systems that put our brothers and sisters into prisons, that lock us out of housing and jobs, and that brutalize us in the streets with the use of police forces, those are the exact same system, imperialism, that is killing our brothers and sisters and children on the border,” stated Loving. 

“We have one enemy, one fight, and that’s to take down everything that this building represents and build a future where our communities have the right to live and build a better world for all of us,” Loving continued.

Xavi Velasquez of La Frontera Nos Cruzó gave a speech condemning the flimsy excuse of “combatting drug trafficking” that Abbott’s policies often employ. “The burden of history shows that shows that empires will use drugs to control whole populations, one example being the British drug trade between India and China, and in the 1980s the CIA helped the Contras smuggle crack onto the streets of America, creating a whole epidemic that many parts of this country are still struggling to recover from,” stated Velasquez. 

“Where is the razor wire around Fort Brag where drug crimes and brutal killings have been surging for years as U.S. military’s special operations personnel have been allowed to rampage for the last few decades? Where is the razor wire that’s gonna stop the killer cops and the murderous Texas National Guard from their crimes. Lastly where is the razor wire to stop Greg Abbott from enacting more programs that kill immigrants, to stop him from taking away women’s rights to their own bodies, or the attacks against our trans brothers and sisters?” asked Velasquez.