Immigration Activists Descend On Over 100 Offices Of House Lawmakers In Last-Minute Push For Reform

As of Friday, lawmakers in the House of Representatives are done for the year. But on Thursday, Politico reports, over 1,000 activists and about 40 House Democrats mounted a final push for action on immigration reform, gathering outside of the Congressional offices of over 100 House lawmakers - including four Democrats - and calling for a comprehensive overhaul in 2014. The protests cap off a week of actions toward that end, including a number aimed at House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), whose refusal to introduce a comprehensive bill passed by the Senate in June has frustrated advocates.

Southern California Public Radio notes that protests this week have included an ongoing, month-long "Fast for Families" on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.; caroling at the Capitol Christmas Tree lighting ceremony (replacing the usual lyrics with immigration reform-themed ones); and putting on a skit skewering Boehner as the Grinch who "ruined Christmas" by not scheduling a vote on legislation extending legal status to many of the nation's estimated 11.7 million undocumented immigrants. On Thursday, protestors - some of whom came from as far away as North Carolina and New York, according to Al Jazeera - staged a sit-in in the Congressional offices,

Meanwhile, from the front steps of the Capitol, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and the group of House Democrats called for Boehner to introduce the Senate's bill before the House finished up its activities for the year. "We have the time before we leave here [on Friday] to bring H.R. 15 to the floor for a vote," Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) said. "Mr. Speaker, as a nation and as a compassionate people, we can do better. We must do better."

Immigrant advocates say they'll keep up the pressure in 2014, the final year on the Congressional calendar and last chance for existing legislation to pass. Gustavo Torres, executive director of CASA in Action, one of the groups that organized the protests on Thursday, told Politico that activists would aim both to keep up their petitioning of lawmakers as well as punish them in elections for continued inaction on the issue, saying they planned a voter registration campaign to get an extra 10 million naturalized citizens on the rolls.