On International Workers’ Day, activists and immigrant families who work in the agricultural sector staged a protest outside the headquarters of the town of Homestead in South Florida.
With just over a year to go until the next general election and five months before the election for mayor of the town of Homestead, the pro-immigrant organization ‘We Count’ has launched its ‘We, People in Action’ campaign, Gente en Acción, known as “WEPA”, to mobilize eligible voters on the importance of exercising their right to vote.
“We have problems with rent, housing costs and we understand that politicians are not listening to the community,” said Claudia Navarro, from the organization WEPA, who pointed out that many migrants “are not going vote because their interests are not represented What WEPA wants to do is go knock on doors, listen to the community.
The Florida Senate on Friday approved a law against illegal immigration, by which employers must verify the immigration status of their workers, while hospitals and health centers will have to document whether the person who goes there is legally in the country.
“We should be worried because these are laws that attack the Latino community and we are against these laws. We are against these attacks because it does not seem fair to us,” says Andrés Díaz, from the We Can organisation.
The law has been a priority for Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who has criticized the federal government for increasing the number of undocumented immigrants in the country.
Blaise Ingoglia, Republican Senator from Florida, points out that “with this law, anyone who hires an illegal immigrant will face penalties so severe that they could result in suspensions or revocations of licenses to operate businesses or companies that violate the law.”
Something that the We Can organization tries to confront, in the same way “this WEPA campaign is to counter the policies that are unfavorable to our Latino community”, affirms Andrés Díaz.