Mexican prelate supports immigrant boycott of U.S. goods

Mexico City, Mexico, Apr 17, 2006 / 22:00 pm

Bishop Renato Ascencio of Juarez, Mexico, announced during Holy Week he would support a commercial boycott planned by immigrants in the U.S. for May 1 in order to demand “integral and just” immigration reform.

Bishop Ascencio, who is also president of the Committee on Human Mobility of the Bishops’ Conference of Mexico, said the boycott was being undertaken by all Hispanics and calls for refraining from the purchase of any U.S. goods.

He said he himself would “set the example” and that on May 1 he would not cross the border into the United States to make purchases.

“We Mexicans who live on this side should express our solidarity with immigrants, just as the Guatemalans, Nicaraguans and others from Central America are doing,” he added.,

Bishop Ascencio said the faithful could join in the boycott by not entering El Paso on May 1 and by refusing to buy U.S. products in Juarez.

As one of the fiercest supporters of the undocumented who travel to, or live in the United States, Bishop Ascencio organized an inter-religious day of prayer last January and expressed his rejection of the “anti-immigrant” law passed in December by the U.S. House of Representatives.

The pending legislation, yet to be passed by the Senate, authorizes the building of a wall on the U.S./Mexican border and seeks to make undocumented immigrants and all those who provide them with assistance, felons.