Many of you have seen my mug shot that appeared on the cover of Al Dia.

The article was a very flattering profile of me, my life and my work. I spoke with Adriana Arvizo on the phone a couple of times for a total of about 2 hours before the article came out. You can get a lot from a person in that much time. Good stuff, bad stuff, verbal accidents and poorly turned phrases, which I often do when I am nervous.

I stayed awake that night worrying about how something that I said might not come across as clearly on the printed page.

Ms. Arviso is a good interviewer. She made me feel very comfortable during our discussion even though we were having some small challenges with the language barrier.

When I read the article I was blown away. Arviso brought forward things that are essential to who I am. I am proud of the person in the article, though I know the real human being has many faults.

Looking back at my month and a half or so of being the coordinator of Reform Immigration for America, I will say that the Latino and immigration rights movement differs notably from the labor movement in that they really support their leaders.

Ali Kronley, brought together an amazing and strong coalition. This coalition embraced me and it is great to work with all of them.

Here is my rough translation of Emily’s translation of the article (you can download the original here)

He lives for the fight, but he is not a boxer or a wrestler. For the last 16 years he has been on the front lines of the battle to improve the lives of the unprotected.

At an young age, he fought to lift up his co-worers in the mines of Arizona.

Fabricio was born in Albuquerque, NM, his mother was American Indian and his father was an undocumented immigrant from Ecuador for 30 years.

“We moved to Arizona so that my father could work in the mine. I was not a very good student and I dropped out of school and my father got me a job in the mine,” he recalled.

He worked in the mines for six years. At one mine the workers had no right to take a lunch break or to wash their hands. This experience was fundamental to putting Fabricio on his professional path. This past week, he was named the coordinator of Reform Immigration for America in Philadelphia. “This was the spark that drove me to fight.”

Rodriguez decided to return to school in 2003 and was awarded a degree in Economic from Arizona State University.

After finishing school, he moved to Philadelphia and until last December worked as the Executive Director of Jobs with Justice.

“I like this city because it is the birth place of American democracy, that spirit continues today. If you sit at City Hall any day of the week, eventually you will see a protest go by.”

“The city is like a hungry dog. You cannot let go of the leash (I said, “We lean at our leash,” but thats a little tough to translate).”

Before he decided to battle for immigration reform, he fought to improve the conditions of low-waged, security guards.

A few weeks ago, th activist traveled to Arizona to protest against Arizona SB 1070. He said “Things are hot down there.” (!?)

“I went to go and see those activists but I did not fear for my safety I am only afraid of loosing. But if you loose, it only means that you have to find a better way to organize.”

Organizing protests, mobilizing the masses, is a great responsibility especially when talking about such extreme measures as civil disobedience.

This defender of justice is optimistic, he said, “History is on our side.”

“My vision is of a fair country, a place moving toward greater diversity. In the past women could not vote and African-Americans we not even considered people.”

…Fabricio Rodríguez, uno de los organizadores de la protesta, declaró que se necesita acabar con la deportación y presionar al presidente Obama para que haga su trabajo.

“Los Phillies son nuestros héroes locales. Con ley 1070 algunos de nuestros héroes se convertirían en blancos de hostilidad y hasta de detención si llegan a ser sospechosos de andar indocumentados y casualmente en el momento en que son detenidos no llevan su identificación con ellos”, agregó Rodríguez.

Here is a radio rip from WHYY about the Diamondbacks protest yesterday…

Also, here is a report from KYW- “Phila. Protestors Mark Intersection of Immigration, Baseball”

Joe DiStefano wrote an article in Sunday’s Inquirer that calls on President Obama to fix our broken immigration system.

In his piece he points out how damaging it would be to our economy if mass deportations occurred. The contributions that migrants make to our economy are rarely talked about.

Many migrant workers pay their full share of taxes. They work for employers with false papers. Though an employer may suspect that the worker has given them fake documents, they are not legally bound to turn a worker over to the police. We should all be glad for that.

Do you want your employers playing a policing roll in your life? What if your employer called the police on you suspecting that you use drugs when you not at work or because they believed that you might be a bad parent?

Employers are legally bound to make sure that their workers pay certain taxes such as social security and unemployment compensation. When you fill out your w-4 tax deduction form when you start working, you instruct your employer how much of you income tax to take out. As long as you are paying the taxes that are mandated by law, the employer is in the clear.

Most migrant workers pay their full share, if for no other reason than to not raise any suspicions.

Due to this, migrant workers have paid millions into Social Security, unemployment, Medicare that they will never benefit from. Can you imagine what bad shape our Social Security system would be without the money of migrants? Migrant workers’ money has gone in to support our parents and grandparents.

DiStefano’s pragmatic view on these issues is refreshing.

Mr. DiStefano and I got to speak a little bit for this article.

He quoted me on part of our discussion where I tried to illustrate what a big role migrants play in our society and in our communities …

“There’s a big chunk of immigrants that drive taxicabs. A large Polish and Russian population is doing a lot of service work, child care and back-of-the-hotel service stuff like cleaning hotel rooms. You have a lot of Haitian immigrants in nursing and long-term care,” Rodriguez said. In each group, there are many here without papers.

“Like my dad was for 30 years,” he said. “These people are your neighbors, raising families, going to church.”

This last bit of my quote reminds me of my childhood and how my father, an undocumented immigrant until 1997, contributed to the social fabric of the community.

On Thursday, I will post a story about our lives in Superior, AZ as an example.