Movimiento Cocecha leaders have three goals: raise awareness about immigrant labor and economic power, polarize public opinion by forcing people to choose between supporting immigration workers or siding with deportation and exploitation, and build popular support for justice campaigns.
”We want people to stand up. We want people not to be silent. The current political climate is anti-immigrant and hateful to undocumented workers.”
Community activist Gema Lowe urges supporters to continue boycotting major corporations, and instead support local, immigrant-owned businesses.
Last week, supporters marched through downtown Grand Rapids disrupting traffic and challenging the Catholic Diocese to publicly oppose mass deportation.
“We put a call-to-action to the diocese and all churches to become spaces where our immigrant community, especially undocumented immigrants, can feel safe going.”
Activists organized a flash mob inside the Walmart on 54th Street, dancing, disrupting business and addressing the crowd about immigration rights before police escorted them out.
“People around us started recording. One of the bystanders put out a TikTok that went out for a quarter of a million views!”
Lowe says they’re getting some results. For instance, in one week two non-profit organizations declared themselves sanctuary spaces.
However, reaction to their tactics is divided.
“Response was mixed. Some were agreeing, some were like this is not the right way to protest, but what is the ‘right way to protest,’ right?”
Movimiento Cosecha urges supporters to attend a rally at the LINC UP Gallery on Hall Street in Grand Rapids this Friday at 5pm.
