BECAUSE Family sponsorships now take up to 14 years and refugee acceptance rates have been cut by 56%

BECAUSE Border guards now have the power to invade women's shelters.
BECAUSE Ford wants to sell public housing, cut TTC buses and charge fees for services; cuts that will impact women, migrant and poor communities the worst
BECAUSE Temporary migrant workers deemed 'low-skill' will be thrown out of Canada after 4 years
BECAUSE Harper wants the 'ethnic' vote, but doesn't want immigrants.
BECAUSE Migrant justice organizers have been beaten, arrested, jailed and continue to face police harassment
BECAUSE Every day in Toronto, 70 community members are swept up and deported
BECAUSE Racist immigration policies are creating conditions of modern day slavery
BECAUSE The Canadian state continues to resist indigenous sovereignty and liberation
BECAUSE We are living in a historic period and we have the power to choose which side of history we want to be on.

For all these reasons, and so many more, we will take to the streets. Democracy doesn't begin and end with a ballot box. Unwilling to wait for the change we want to see, we will create it. From the ground up. By the power of the people.

WHY NO ONE IS ILLEGAL MAY DAY OF ACTION?

In April 2006, days after Harper came to power, he began a series of round ups in the Dufferin Mall area, racially profiling, arresting and detaining hundreds of migrants without full status. In response, thousands of people took to the streets for the 1st Annual May Day of Action for Status for All in Toronto. We did so in conjunction with the massive immigrant rights demonstrations in the United States and keeping with the history of International Workers Day to defend the most marginalized members of the working class. For the last six years, we've fought the Federal Tories at every step, stopping deportations, attacking further regressive immigration policies and supporting our communities. We've won access to schools, to food, to healthcare, to anti-violence against women services for some. At the same time we've lost some of our strongest voices to detention, and deportation - most recently Daniel Garcia, deported from Parkdale on January 1, 2011. This May Day, we will march from Parkdale, where Daniel Garcia was arrested to Dufferin Mall, where the US style immigration enforcement raids began over 5 years ago.

WHAT IS STATUS FOR ALL?

Federal, provincial and municipal governments deny good food, healthcare, livelihood, childcare, education, shelter, justice and dignity to those without full immigration status. All people, with or without status must be able to live freely, with respect, without fear. We also know that for indigenous people, for poor people, for immigrants of color, for many women, queer people and the disabled community, citizenship does not ensure basic freedoms. The fight for Status is a fight for all people, irrespective of citizenship, gender, sexuality, disability or racialization, to access freedoms that immigration status is supposed to provide.

In the spirit of solidarity, and building the movement we need to see in this city, the No One Is Illegal march for Status for All will be converging with the May 1st Movement march at Dufferin Grove Park.

On May Day take to the streets to demand, to assert and to commit to:

* JUSTICE for Undocumented People and Migrant Workers: STATUS FOR ALL! ACCESS WITHOUT FEAR!
* JUSTICE for Our Communities: raise the rates, living wage, unionization, free and accessible public services for all, violent cops out of our neighborhoods
* FREEDOM to Move, FREEDOM to Return, and FREEDOM to Stay
* FREEDOM from Colonization, Military and Economic Wars and Environmental Degradation

Supported by: Worker's Action Centre | Canadian Arab Federation | Justicia for Migrant Workers | Caregivers Action Center | Educators for Peace and Justice | Sistering | South Asian Women's Rights Organization | Jane Finch Action Against Poverty | Good Jobs for All Coalition | Migrant Worker's Alliance for Change | Toronto Rape Crisis Center | CUPE - Ontario | Canadian Federation of Students - Ontario | Bolivarian Circle | OCAP | Davenport Neighbours for Peace | Greater Toronto Workers Assembly | Ryerson Students Union | National Council of Latin American and Caribbean Women of Canada - LATIN@S | Health for All | Environmental Justice Toronto | Hassle Free Clinic | Mata Danze | South Asian Legal Clinic of Ontario | The Bread and Bricks Social Justice Group | The Toronto New Socialists | Ontario Secondary School Teachers Federation District 12 Human Right Committee | York Federation of Students | Toronto Immigration Legal Committee | University of Toronto Students Union | The Women's Coordinating Committee for a Free Wallmapu | Toronto Coalition to Stop the War | Women in Solidarity with Palestine | No One Is Illegal - Vancouver | Ontario Public Interest Research Group - York | Ontario Public Interest Research Group - UofT | Students For Medicare | The Centre for Women and Trans People (Toronto) | The Trans Inclusion Group | AW@L | Communist Part of Canada - Toronto Committee | Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN) | LAL | Medical Reform Group | The Public Health Social Justice Collective | Health Providers Against Poverty | Health Studies Union of U of T | York University Free Press | Toronto Forum on Cuba | CUPE International Solidarity Committee | Mujeres Al Frente | Social Planning Toronto | Afghans for Peace | Canadian Arab Federaion | Faculty for Palestine | Students Against Israeli Apartheid - York and more. To endorse, email nooneisillegal@riseup.net

Media partner: rabble.ca