Chicago May Day rally draws huge crowd

Despite expectations that this year's May Day rally and march in support of immigration reform would prove something of a non-event, with as few as 20,000 turning out, a huge number of Chicago-area residents showed up for the march and rally, working men and women and their entire families, many young folk, and the odd radical, anarchist and wobblie wannabee joined together in a raucus, exuberant, ultimately peaceful and good humored demonstration.

Naturally most immigration-reform supporters are anxious that some kind of legislation gets passed soon, many are worried over recent raids that are leading to family separations and are widely viewed as window dressing aimed at demonstrating that aggressive new enforcement would accompany any compromise on reform. The rally in Chicago probably would have been a lot smaller if it weren't for an oddly timed and overly dramatic ICE and FBI raid at an open air market in a predominately Mexican community. Folks from that immigrant community were outraged by this machine-gun wielding show of force on the part of federal officials and the chaos and fear their appearance engendered. On May 1, they took to the streets and a lot of them don't seem to care anymore about their dubious legal status in the U.S., they're seeking to protect basic human rights that, like money and hunger, don't stop at any imaginary borders. "Bush, escucha, estamos in la lucha . . . " Look for more on the rally at this site soon.