I'll probably get stuck in a rally on my way home. Apparently they are setting up camp in Union Square. I would love to dodge at all costs. :roll: Let's just hope they don't have snakes draped over their necks like at the PR and DR pride parades.
Day Without Immigrants
BROOKVILLE, N.Y. (1010 WINS) -- Small businesses were closed in some parts of the city, and suburban worksites normally crowded with day laborers remained empty, as New Yorkers took part in a national day of economic protest by illegal immigrants and their allies.
As part of the Day Without Immigrants, protesters formed human chains throughout New York City's five boroughs to protest a bill that would make it a felony to be in the country illegally.
An afternoon rally in Manhattan's Union Square was planned for late afternoon.
In Manhattan, several shops were shuttered along 14th Street. Near Seventh Avenue, a little storefront selling Cuban sandwiches and other Latin American food had a sign in the window that said 'Closed May 1' in English and Spanish.
VIDEO: Immigrants rally, stay away from work as part of national boycott.
A disappointed customer, Miriam Chaikin, pulled on the door several times before noticing the sign.
"I was hoping to get beans and rice and plantain,'' she said.
"The country needs immigrants,'' Chaikin said when asked how she felt about the boycott. ``I think I would like them all to speak English and sing the national anthem in English the way my parents did, but we're a nation of immigrants.''
Next door, at the Papaya King, where like at many New York businesses a high percentage of employees are immigrants, it was business as usual.
Dan Horan, who runs four Papaya King stores, said as far he knew none of his approximately 40 employees took the day off.
"It hasn't been an issue,'' he said.
In Chinatown, one of the sites where human chains were formed, protesters held up signs that read: "I love Immigrant New York'' and "We Are America.''
1010 WINS Audio: Jackson Heights Rally
The human chains were all formed at precisely 12:16 p.m. to mark the day, Dec. 16, when the House of Representatives passed the bill that would make felons of illegal aliens. A version of the bill has stalled in the Senate.
Elsewhere in Chinatown, which was as bustling as usual and where all the shops appeared to be operating normally, about 100 people rallied in front of a statue of Confucius and then marched past businesses as curious employees looked on.
One rally participant, Diana Taylor, a professor of theater studies at New York University, identified herself as an immigrant from Mexico who's lived in the United States for 23 years.
She said she didn't think there was a strong anti-immigrant sentiment in New York but feels there was elsewhere in the country.
"I was offered a job in San Diego but I didn't take it,'' she said. "I don't like the way they treat Mexicans in California.''
On the other side of town, in the heavily Dominican neighborhood of Washington Heights in Upper Manhattan, hundreds of immigrants and supporters of all ages marched along the sidewalks of St. Nicholas Avenue. As passing motorists honked in support, demonstrators chanted "Yes we can!'' in Spanish.
New Main Street in Yonkers, the commercial strip for a heavily Mexican neighborhood of Westchester County, was nearly deserted Monday morning, most of its shops shuttered, until six yellow school buses arrived. Hundreds of people, including scores of children, appeared and climbed aboard to go to the Manhattan rally.
Adrian Medina, waving a small Mexican flag, shouted in Spanish, "We're not leaving this country.''
"We are here to support the rally,'' he said. ``We support not just Mexicans but Japanese and Arabic and everybody.''
As the first bus left, two American flags were unfurled from its windows.
Dustin Langley, a spokesman for the New York Committee for May 1, said taxi drivers, who can't afford to boycott the entire day, were stopping for about one hour at midday. Langley said he thought workers at other jobs would also take short breaks rather than stay away all day.
On Long Island, the Rev. Allan Ramirez, pastor of the Brookville Dutch Reform Church and an advocate for the immigrant community, said he visited numerous sites in Nassau County where day laborers gather daily, and they all looked like ghost towns shortly after 6 a.m.
"These 'early returns' told me this (boycott) is moving forward,'' said Ramirez.
He said there were no workers in sight in Locust Valley, where normally 50 to 75 immigrants gather each morning; on Willis Avenue in Roslyn, where about 75 to 100 usually gather; and on Grand Avenue in New Cassel, where more than 350 immigrants congregate daily. Sites at Farmingdale, Freeport and Farmingville, one of the largest day laborer spots, also were empty, he said.
At the Belmont race track, about 50 to 75 immigrants showed up for a mini rally. A bigger rally was planned for in front of the Hempstead Village Hall later Monday. From there, buses were to take the immigrants to the large rally in Union Square.
