In the heart of Chicago, the simmering frustration among long-established immigrants has reached a boiling point, as they clamor for the same federal recognition newly arrived migrants have received under President Biden’s administration. Their message is simple: "Please don't forget about us, we need job permits too," decried Juana Arreguin, a Mexican immigrant who has spent nearly three decades in the U.S., in an interview with the Chicago Tribune. The owner of an ice cream shop, Arreguin shares the plight of many immigrants who silently contribute to the economy, yet remain unrecognized and unsupported by the system that benefits from their labor.
This inequity has prompted hundreds from the Chicago area to decisively plan a march to Washington D.C. in a powerful demonstration for reform. Advocates are to speak out against the Biden administration's selective issuance of work permits. Erendira Rendon, vice president of Immigrant Justice with The Resurrection Project, told WTTW, "It’s very clear that the Biden administration is intentionally ignoring the undocumented community who have been here for an average of 20 years in the US working without authorization, working under the shadows." The push comes on the heels of the administration's move to grant temporary protected status to a new wave of migrants, particularly from Venezuela.
Efforts to pursue justice have encountered not only blatant inaction but also the hypocrisy of a nation that recently expedited work permit applications and granted additional resources to Venezuelan immigrants. Meanwhile, community stalwarts like Arreguin and Consuelo Martinez, who have been contributing meaningfully to society for years, if not decades, are left languishing and unnoticed. Martinez, who has been living in the United States for 27 years without a work permit, drew attention to her plight by taking the stage at a Pilsen rally with a sign stating her predicament.
Reacting to the deeply rooted systemic issues, Susan Gzesh, a professor and attorney, explained to WTTW that history showcases a grim pattern: "Overnight, they transformed a flow of people that had been largely legal to a flow of people because people were still coming for the same reasons ... but they changed the nature of that status from legal to illegal." This bureaucratic metamorphosis has caught countless immigrants, yearning for a semblance of stability and legitimacy, in a seemingly endless cycle of marginalization. The march to Washington aims to not only brightly spotlight this issue but also, potentially, to force a pivotal turn in policies long overdue for reform.
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