Postville detainees embrace role as rights advocates

The 19-month ordeal of immigrants arrested in last year's immigration raid at the former Agriprocessors meatpacking plant has turned many of them into human rights activists.

“They are the Rosa Parkses of our generation,” said Sister Mary McCauley, referring to the Hispanic mothers forced to wear GPS ankle bracelets as a condition of their release from jail to care for their children.

Like Parks, who in 1955 became a hero of the civil rights movement when she refused to give up her seat on an Alabama bus, the Postville women have come to symbolize the movement to recognize the human rights of immigrants, said McCauley, a retired pastoral administrator at St. Bridget Catholic Church in Postville.

In their steadfast advocacy of the rights of immigrants and their dignity under duress, they have served as sympathetic faces for the victims of collateral damage wrought by enforcement of U.S. immigration laws, said McCauley, who worked daily with the women until her recent retirement.

After the raid, which resulted in nearly 400 arrests and the imprisonment of about 300 workers, more than 40 women were initially required to wear the tracking devices as a condition of staying out of jail. Some have since left the country and others have been granted visas, enabling them to shed the transmitters.

The last 11 bracelets will be removed from their wearers Wednesday at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement office in Cedar Rapids, said Violeta Aleman, a Hispanic liaison at St. Bridget's.

One of those last bracelet wearers, Mexican immigrant Roselia Ramirez Martinez, makes no apology for coming to the United States without benefit of a visa.

Martinez said the immigrants believe their only crime was to take difficult, low-paying jobs unwanted by most U.S. citizens in an effort to improve the lives of their families.

Martinez, a Postville resident for nearly nine years, said she wants to stay here and fight for laws that would benefit all undocumented immigrant workers in the United States.

“We should follow the example of all those who contributed to St. Bridget's to help us through our difficult times and fight for what's right,” she said.

Estela Vega Nava, who came to Postville from Mexico eight years ago, said she and her fellow activists aspire to be “the light that comes on a dark day, a beacon to help expose the truth” about the enforcement of U.S. immigration laws.

“They see they have a hand in something bigger than themselves,” said the Rev. Paul Ouderkirk, a retired pastor at St. Bridget's and a leader in the church's ministry to the immigrants.

They believe their suffering, which included privation and separation from family members, can highlight the nation's broken immigration system and stimulate reform that includes a pathway to U.S. citizenship for themselves and the millions of others in similar circumstances, Ouderkirk said.

Despite their ill treatment, they say, the experience has strengthened their faith, and they pray daily for the donors whose contributions to St. Bridget's have helped them to survive.

St Bridget's “has been like my home” throughout the ordeal. “What would I have done without it?” said Maria Ruiz-Chuy, a 10-year Postville resident from Guatemala.

“St. Bridget's has been a godsend for all of us. I could never have enough time to properly thank them for all they have done,” said Quendi Garcia-Vega, who came to Postville from Mexico 10 years ago.

Without the support of the church, they would not have had their chance to speak out against injustice, said Mexican immigrant Alicia Lopez Nava, who came to Postville nearly 10 years ago.

“Agriprocessors has been the darkness. The church has been the light,” she said.