20 Arrested At D.C. Immigration Protest

Latoya Agnew got arrested for the first time in her life. For her fellow protester John Lewis, it was arrest number 45, at least.

Agnew and some four dozen other New Haveners arrived home Wednesday afternoon on a bus from the nation’s capital, where they had joined a mass protest Tuesday calling on Congress to take up a stalled immigration-reform bill.

Police arrested about 200 protesters committing civil disobedience at the protest. The arrestees included eight members of Congress (such as Lewis) and 20 of the activists who came from New Haven under the banners of of the New Haven Rising and UNITE/HERE. Newhallville Alderwoman Delphine Clyburn was among the New Haveners arrested.

The day began with a rally at the national Mall featuring speakers and drawing about 15,000 activists from around the country.

A march through the streets followed. The 200 arrestees sat down and blocked traffic. In a ritual pre-choreographed with D.C. police, they refused three orders to clear the street.

They spent the evening (and in some cases until early morning) being processed at a large facility and then paying $50 fines to be released. Police brought them cheese and balogna sandwiches.

Agnew, 21-year-old organizer of the youth-oriented New Haven Rising, called the trip ​“inspirational.”

“This is the fight we’re fighting in New Haven,” she said. ​“It’s the rights of people in general, not just immigrants.”

Agnew rode in a police van chatting with fellow arrestee U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky of Illinois. Her biggest thrill came later in the processing center, when she shook the hand of civil-rights hero and U.S. Rep. John Lewis of Georgia. Lewis’s office estimated Tuesday’s arrest as ​“at least” his 45th in protests since the 1960s, when police fractured his skull during the famous 1965 ​“Bloody March” in Selma.

“It was inspirational being there with John Lewis and seeing him get arrested. This issue really mattered,” Agnew said Wednesday. When Lewis departed, he dropped his red armband from the protest; Agnew returned to New Haven with that armband attached to her backpack.

Lewis’s presence also made an impression on 37-year-old New Haven lab tech Jess Corbett as he waited hours in the detention facility to be processed for his arrest. Corbett had been feeling impatient.

“Then looking at John Lewis sitting there in front of me, thinking of the risks he went through [in the ​‘60s] — getting his head cracked in and wondering if he was going to wake up in the morning … I stopped whining,” Corbett recalled.

Fellow New Haven arrestee Kenneth Reveiz, who’s 23, brought along a book called Queering Anarchism for the long bus rides to and from D.C..

Between sleep and the excitement of the trip, he didn’t read a page.

“To me, it was an honor to be arrested with a lot of undocumented people,” he said. ​“A lot of them were Dreamers, people trying to reform the education process,” Reveiz said. He said he also sees immigration as a ​“queer issue. A lot of this has to do with living in the shadows. I’m not undocumented, but a lot of people I know are.”

Alderwoman Clyburn said she had been arrested once before, at a state workers’ protest against former Gov. John Rowland. She didn’t remember handcuffs being on tight as they were Tuesday evening. She also didn’t enjoy being searched twice Tuesday. She was still glad she participated.

“I wanted to make be a part of the fight for the rights of immigrants,” Clyburn said. ​“They have a right to jobs, education, and a place to live.”