On Wednesday in a speech on the floor of Congress, Rep. Luis V. Gutiérrez (D-IL) issued a call to action to resist the Trump Administration’s plans to turn 1.2 million immigrants with documents into undocumented immigrants in the coming weeks or months by ending the DACA program and TPS. He also announced he would participate in a community meeting this Saturday in Chicago to strategize – and begin the organizing process – and invited diverse allies to join the effort. “Fighting for DACA and fighting to keep millions of people in this country who have put down roots and built lives here is going to be a people’s fight,” the Illinois Congressman said. “And the effort to find ways to protect families and cope with more than a million people being pushed into the black market requires us to organize in every community.”

He spoke specifically of teachers, environmentalists, and those who have stood up to bathroom laws and fighting discrimination in all its forms to join the effort, which starts in Chicago with an initial strategy meeting open to the public at Lincoln United Methodist Church (2009 W 22nd Place at S. Damon, Chicago, 60608) at 2p.m., Saturday, July 22. “If you marched with your pink hat at the Women’s March, I am asking you now on behalf of immigrants and the very future of immigration to stand with us….At airports across the country we stood up for refugees and said no to Trump’s Muslim ban, we need you. Black Lives Matter, we need you and frankly, we need each other. People are going to peacefully stand up and fight for justice, common sense, and what is right – and we need everyone to be there with us, helping us, walking with us.”

DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), a program in which 800,000 young immigrants are enrolled, is facing a court challenge from Republican leaders and could be terminated in September if the Trump Administration, as expected, does not fight back. TPS (Temporary Protected Status) has given at least 400,000 people the ability to live and work legally in the U.S., but the Department of Homeland Security has indicated strongly that they will let TPS expire for the ten countries that have it now. Congressman Gutiérrez concluded by saying: “The road ahead is not going to be easy, but we have fought hard to win victories for our country, and for the DREAMers, who are the leading edge of our movement to make immigration legal again. Now is the time. We need your help to protect families and communities and what is right. And we cannot do it alone.”