Eighteen-year-old Myra Cerecero said she wakes up every morning praying her parents made it home safely.
"I'm living in a constant state of fear they'll be picked up," said the daughter of illegal immigrants. The American-born Loganville teen was among roughly 10,000 to 15,000 people, according to Capitol police, who jammed the streets of downtown Atlanta Saturday morning to voice their opposition to House Bill 87, Georgia's crackdown on illegal immigrants.
The recently signed bill penalizes those who use false identification to secure jobs as well as government officials who fail to enforce the state's immigration laws.
Though the law went into effect Friday, protest organizers say the fight to repeal HB 87 is far from over.
"This is the beginning of the end, not the end," said Teodoro Maus, president of the Georgia Latino Alliance on Human Rights (GLAHR).
Protesters invoked President Barack Obama's name repeatedly as they marched past the state Capitol, signifying their support of the federal DREAM Act, which would provide conditional permanent residency to certain illegal immigrants, such as high school graduates, who came to this country as minors.
"We need comprehensive immigration reform," said Helen Kim Ho, executive director of the Asian American Legal Advocacy Center, one of 62 organizations that participated in Saturday's march. "Change has to come from the federal level."
Mableton resident Alma Olmedo said she's not optimistic about a federal solution.
"Obviously the federal government is not doing anything for us so we'll have to do it for ourselves," said the 22-year-old, holding a sign declaring "I will not live in the shadows."
Olmedo, who came to the U.S. when she was 5 years old, said she fears the consequences of HB 87.
"I could end up being sent back to a place (Guadalajara, the capital of the Mexican state of Jalisco, where Olmedo was born) I don't remember to live among people I don't know," she said as marchers chanted "Si, se puede," Spanish for Obama's 2008 campaign slogan, "Yes we can."
The message Saturday was about more than politics, according to Adelina Nicholls, executive director of the GLAHR.
"We believe they have the right to stay here," she said. "Our kids have grown up here. We work here. This is our country also."
HB 87's opponents welcomed one small victory this week, as a federal judge blocked some contested parts of the bill, including a provision that empowered local and state police to investigate the immigration status of certain suspects and another that punished those who harbor illegal immigrants.
Georgia is one of several states to adopt tough immigration legislation patterned after the groundbreaking law enacted in Arizona last year.
D.A. King, president of The Dustin Inman Society, which he described as "pro-enforcement on American immigration and employment laws," said the rally participants are on the opposite side of the majority of U.S. opinion.
"Most Americans realize that we take in more legal immigrants than any nation on the planet -- more than 1 million a year," King said. "Most Americans watching this rally understand that these people's message is one of anti-enforcement, open borders and separatism."
King said HB 87 "is doing exactly what it was intended to do and I, along with a majority of Georgians who oppose illegal immigration, are very happy -- elated -- to watch illegal immigrants migrate out of Georgia."
King said "we will really know we have an effective immigration law when we make ours closer to what they have in Mexico," which he said is far more stringent.
-- Staff writer Joel Provano contributed to this article.
About the Author
