2006 United States immigration reform protests

2006 United States immigration reform protests
Thousands gather in favor of immigrants' rights in Nashville, Tennessee on March 29, 2006
Date	March - May

In 2006–2007, millions of people participated in protests over a proposed change to U.S. immigration policy.^[1] These large scale mobilizations are widely seen as a historic turning point in Latino politics, especially Latino immigrant civic participation and political influence, as noted in a range of scholarly publications in this field.^[1] The protests began in response to proposed legislation known as H.R. 4437, which would raise penalties for illegal immigration and classify illegal individuals and anyone who helped them enter or remain in the US as felons. As part of the wider immigration debate, most of the protests not only sought a rejection of this bill, but also a comprehensive reform of the country's immigration laws that included a path to citizenship for all illegal immigrants.

The 2006 immigration protests were a series of demonstrations that began in Chicago and continued throughout major cities nationwide for a period of eight weeks. The first major demonstration in Chicago was held on March 10, 2006, and was estimated to have about 100,000 participants. It was the initial impetus for many of the other protests which followed throughout the country.^[2] The largest single protest occurred on March 25, 2006, in downtown Los Angeles with an official estimate of more than 500,000 people marching in what organizers called "La Gran Marcha" ("The Great March") .^[3] Organizers of La Gran Marcha, however, state that the actual revised number of participants is somewhere between 1.25 and 1.5 million estimated through later photographic analysis.^[4] The largest nationwide day of protest occurred on April 10, 2006, in 102 cities across the country,^[5][6] with 350,000–500,000 in Dallas. The overwhelming majority of the protests were peaceful and attracted modest media attention. Additional protests took place on May Day.