Immigration: The New Willie Horton?Barbara Lopezbyline‚ Aug. 24‚ 2007On August 20th, the day after Elvira Arellano was deported, immigration activists and supporters held a vigil in front of San Francisco's Federal Building. Elvira, a mother of a U.S. citizen child who sought refuge in a church, garnered national attention. She became a symbol of the immigration movement when she revealed her status as undocumented. On that Sunday, when ICE detained her in front of her child as she was leaving church, it sent shock waves through the immigrant community. The Spanish press was out in full form, but the English-speaking press was not in sight. Nowhere is the polarization of the immigration debate more painfully evident than in the press coverage. While Spanish-speaking press has whole sections devoted to immigration and depicts the real human cost to “appease the public” immigration policies, English-Language press is still very much on a witch hunt. |