2008 Woodie Awards
New insights on immigration
Lisa Oesterreicher
Issue date: 11/14/05 Section: News
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Though it might be a question pondered by baseball fans, Azemun's take on it has little to do with baseball: immigrants have added a great deal to our country and continue to do so.
But many immigrants are not given the rights they should have. The United States has millions of undocumented immigrants who work, pay taxes, and contribute to our country, but are afraid to speak out. "The immigration system is broken and it must be fixed," he said.
Azemun is senior organizer of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, an association that works through the southwestern suburbs of Chicago, making certain that newcomers to society are integrating into America successfully.
About 10 percent of Illinois's population consists of immigrants, and one third of them are undocumented, meaning that they either crossed the border into the U.S. without a visa or that they legally entered the country but overstayed their visa.
Immigrants in Illinois come from all over the world, most commonly the Philippines, Mexico, India, Korea and Poland. These undocumented immigrants are some of the most vulnerable people in the United States.
Azemun says, "Many of them are exploited in the workplace, taking the worst kinds of jobs and, because they can be thrown out of the country at any time, employer after employer will exploit them."
The most common form of exploitation has immigrants working unreasonably long hours for sometimes less than minimum wage.
Employers know that most immigrants come to the United States to make money, so they can manipulate workers easily.
Azemun also mentioned that a push-pull system has been created which leads to immigrants' desperation to get into the United States.
They are pulled here because we have jobs that are available, but because some of their countries have created bad economic environments, they are also pushed here because they are in serious need of money, and this is where the jobs are.
In order to prevent illegal entrance into the United States, there is now twice the amount of patrolling along the southwestern border.
They have unintentionally helped produce a market for human smugglers. Smuggling has led to the deaths of many immigrants, especially those coming from Mexico who are often abandoned by their smugglers after paying for transportation and left for dead in the desert.
