On May 1, people gathered in the Latino neighborhood of Minneapolis and marched through the main immigrant business sector, to end at a local park for a rally. Police estimated 2000 participants (compared to 400 last year). The crowd was probably about one-third Latino immigrants.
MIRAc (the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee) spent over three months organizing the march. There were over 50 endorsing organizations, including unions (AFSCME, HERE, SEIU, UTU, and others).
Aztec dancers led the march. The marchers made stops along the route to target local campaigns, including Kmart (where cleaning workers are organizing), Wells Fargo, the police precinct, and the local DMV (where immigrants are organizing a campaign for a municipal ID).
The rally included speakers from the Latino, Asian, and Somali immigrant communities, Occupy, Committee to Stop FBI Repression, unions, and other activist groups.
> The article above was written by Lisa Luinenburg, and first appeared in the May 2012 print edition of Socialist Action newspaper.
