Photo (Above): Dolly Fares from Lebanon takes the Oath of Allegiance during a U.S. naturalization ceremony at the Great Park in Irvine, CA on Thursday, December 2, 2021. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)
"Nothing makes you belong more than becoming a citizen." — Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti
By ROXANA KOPETMAN | rkopetman@scng.com | Orange County RegisterPUBLISHED: February 22, 2022 at 6:27 p.m. | UPDATED: February 25, 2022 at 1:47 p.m.
The mayors of Los Angeles and Long Beach joined representatives from local and national groups Tuesday to boost a campaign to help two million legal residents become naturalized U.S. citizens by the end of this year.
There are some 9 million legal permanent residents in the U.S. who are eligible for citizenship but have yet to take the step of applying. A campaign dubbed “Naturalize 2 million by 2022!” kicked off on the steps of L.A.’s City Hall in downtown, part of a nationwide effort to increase the ranks of citizens. In California, state officials are kicking in $25 million to cover the $725 citizenship application fee for eligible residents who apply through various immigration services providers.
“Sixty-three percent of the city of Los Angeles is either an immigrant or a child of an immigrant,” said L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti during a noon-time press conference. “And for a few of us who who are grandchildren of immigrants, it probably gets up to 85 or 90 % of our population.”
Long Beach Mayor Robert Garcia, who emigrated from Peru with his family when he was 5, said he became a naturalized citizen when he was 21, “and 15 years later, I was mayor of my city.
“That would not have been possible had it not been for the hard work of going and earning that citizenship.”
The campaign was launched by the National Partnership for New Americans, a coalition of dozens of immigrant advocacy groups, in partnership with the the L.A.-based Coalition for Humane Immigrants Rights, known as CHIRLA, and the Service Employment International Union.
Their goal is two million new citizens nationwide before the end of the year. In California alone, there are approximately 2.1 million permanent legal residents, about half of them in the Los Angeles area.
One of the most important rights afforded citizens is the right to vote.
“By definition, new American citizens and voters are voters of colors. And we aim with this campaign to swell their ranks significantly,” said Angelica Salas, CHIRLA’s executive director.
Latinos and Asian Americans have traditionally backed Democratic candidates by large margins and higher naturalization rates in these communities could affect future local and national elections.
Other similar campaigns to encourage eligible residents to become naturalized included a push in 2013 by immigrant advocacy groups. The federal agency that processes citizenship applications — the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, or USCIS — also has at times worked to raise awareness about the rights, responsibilities and importance of U.S. citizenship, with information sessions at local libraries and other programs.
During the press conference Tuesday, Garcetti noted the role that immigrant workers — whether in grocery stores, hospitals and other sites — played during the pandemic. Those workers, he said, “kept our city going and kept our families alive.”
“Immigrants made sure we survived these last two years,” Garcetti said. “The least this country can do is to continue our tradition of saying ‘This is a country where you belong,’ and here in Los Angeles, we are saying ‘This is a city where you belong.’
“And nothing makes you belong more than becoming a citizen.”