Freedom Parade: Alternative to Canceled Cinco de Mayo Event

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Longtime Houstonian Linda Morales has been celebrating Cinco de Mayo since she was a little girl. This year, however, she’ll stay home. Houston’s League of United Latin American Citizens District VIII announced in late February that the Cinco de Mayo parade, originally scheduled for May 2, is canceled because immigrants are expressing “genuine, paralyzing fear that attending a high-profile public gathering could result in the irreversible separation of families.” “We cannot, in good conscience, ignore those cries for help or downplay the very real risks our community faces daily,” LULAC District VIII member and historian David Contreras said in a statement. Contreras told the Houston Press that he was disappointed to learn that another LULAC council, District 18, is planning to host an alternative event called the Freedom Parade. He won’t be attending, and neither will Morales. “ICE is coming after anyone and everyone, and I hate for kids to be put in that situation,” Morales says. Former Houston ISD trustee Sergio Lira confirmed that LULAC District 18 is hosting a Freedom Parade from 10 a.m. to noon May 2 downtown near Houston City Hall. He said details are still being worked out and a press conference would be called this week. “We want to offer an alternative to the cancellation from the other district,” Lira says. “I’m not privy as to why they decided not to [have the Cinco de Mayo parade], considering we have a lot of citywide events going on like Tejano Day at the rodeo, the FIFA World Cup, and Mexico playing at the baseball classic. We want to show unity and solidarity with the community.” Lira added that he hasn’t seen any data to support that a Cinco de Mayo parade would be a “high-risk endeavor.” He says high school marching bands and elected officials have been invited to participate in Freedom Day, and organizers are recruiting corporate sponsors. “The fear of ICE is real, but I haven’t seen data on raids at major events,” he says. “I haven’t had any concerns about arrests from ICE in our schools or churches here in the Houston area. Some folks have gone into the shadows but most folks are going about their business. You’ve got to provide for your family. We weighed the benefits over the negatives, and now more than ever, we need to celebrate our culture and traditions and show the world we’re not bad people.” LULAC District 18 is organizing an alternative event since the annual Cinco de Mayo parade was canceled. Credit: LULAC District 18 ICE has not, to date, had a strong presence at Houston protests and parades, but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen, according to Contreras. “The safety of our children and their parents remains our highest priority,” says Contreras, a native Houstonian who joined LULAC as a junior member when he was 14 years old. “LULAC District VIII is not willing to put any child, family member, volunteer, or participant at risk for a parade — no matter how meaningful or celebrated the tradition may be.” LULAC District VIII has hosted the Cinco de Mayo parade since 1994. It’s been canceled before, during the COVID-19 pandemic, but never because of immigration concerns. Cinco de Mayo commemorates the Mexican army’s unlikely victory over French forces at the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862. “There are maybe 20 LULAC councils in Houston, and one of the members in our council is a teacher,” Contreras says. “Many of her students are immigrants and she said at least a couple have been deported and some are considering self-deportation for fear of being separated from their families. We think that the majority of the people who would be out there at the parade are people who are close to their heritage. They’ll be at risk of being arrested or deported.” Morales says Cinco de Mayo is not just a parade. “It’s culture,” she says. “It’s history. It’s families on sidewalks waving flags. It’s music, food, children dancing, abuelitas smiling, and generations remembering that we have always been here. When something like that is canceled, it feels bigger than an event. It feels personal.” Paralyzing Fear Thousands of people in Harris County were detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in 2025, with 3,500 arrested in a regional sting conducted in October and November. Eighty-five people with immigration-related warrants were identified by the Houston Police Department, according to Chief Noe Diaz. The Harris County Jail leads the nation in ICE detainers — requests from immigration agents to hold a person for deportation — with more than 9,500 reported last year. The Deportation Data Project reports that ICE arrests in Texas increased by 135 percent during the first nine months of the second Trump administration compared with the same period in 2024, when Joe Biden was President. That’s devastating for Harris County’s Latino community, which accounts for about 45 percent of the population, Contreras says. While a fraction of the 2 million Latinos in Harris County are undocumented, the concern about being deported or detained extends to people of all ages, races and statuses, he says. Alfredo Dominguez, 29, grew up in Pasadena and moved to Houston after attending graduate school at Georgetown University. He’s been to many Cinco de Mayo parades over the years and says the cancellation shows how helpless the Houston PD is in guaranteeing that its residents won’t be detained or deported. “To community members, it communicates that we’re under siege,” he says. “It’s not that all the immigrants would have wanted to go celebrate Cinco de Mayo. It’s that important programs have to get shuttered in favor of the federal agenda.” Through his work with the Peoples’ Counsel, an advocacy group for survivors of police violence, Dominguez has heard from many who believe ICE is taking a targeted approach in Houston, following people home from work, transferring them from jail to detention centers and arresting them at mandatory check-ins. Data show that Texas has the most ICE detainees. Credit: Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse There’s also a growing concern that people are impersonating ICE agents or immigration attorneys to extort money from scared families, Dominguez says. Many undocumented immigrants are choosing to stay away from Cinco de Mayo celebrations and the FIFA World Cup, which has seven matches scheduled in June and July at Houston’s NRG Stadium, he added. “Anytime there’s a mass gathering of people, that’s the highest risk for violence,” Dominguez says. “Within these big groups of people, police officers and ICE agents can get intimidated because they’re vastly outnumbered. It only takes one thing to happen for these things to go the Minnesota way. That’s what’s terrifying for us. It hasn’t happened in Houston yet, but the potential is there. It’s a powder keg.” Morales works for the Texas Gulf Coast Area Labor Federation but is currently on disability leave while she recovers from hip surgery. She says the panic among Latinos in Houston has escalated in recent months to a situation where people are afraid to even leave their homes. Her advice in the short-term is not to go to any organized Cinco de Mayo events and use discretion when determining whether to attend rallies and protests like the upcoming No Kings event on March 28. For the long term, she says, “have a plan.” Undocumented immigrants are encouraged to write important phone numbers on their bodies when they leave the house because if they are taken to a detention center, their cell phone will likely be confiscated. “A couple of days ago, we found out that HPD was taking what they call ‘illegal immigrants’ to ICE and dropping them off,” Morales says. Mayor John Whitmire and Chief Diaz held a press conference last week and acknowledged that at least two officers on separate occasions violated department policy by transporting a person with a non-criminal immigration warrant to federal authorities. Morales says, “We’re just living in a different world right now and we don’t know what’s going to happen. At 70 years old, I just went and got a passport. I’ve never had a passport before.” “People don’t want to go out,” she added. “They’re afraid. Evidence of that is that we’re missing 4,000 students at HISD because they don’t want to go to school. They’re in fear. We’re not living in sane times.” Dominguez, who was born in Houston, never leaves home without his driver’s license. Contreras, a third-generation American citizen, says he gets stopped frequently because of his dark skin. His wife, who is light-complected, doesn’t get questioned, he says. “Immigrants, especially first-generation, are scared to death.” HPD Cooperation With ICE A new policy directive issued March 11 mandates that when HPD officers encounter a person with a non-criminal immigration warrant, they must call a sergeant to the scene. They can’t transport someone based solely on the immigration warrant. If the sergeant determines that ICE should be contacted, the federal agents have 30 minutes to respond. Diaz says about 350,000 police reports were filed last year, and 220 were related to immigration issues. Of the 85 people HPD encountered with immigration warrants, 17 were taken into ICE custody and 20 were arrested, charged with “other offenses” and taken to the Harris County Jail, meaning more than half were released, according to Diaz. The mayor and police chief have said repeatedly that they have to follow the law under Senate Bill 4. HPD maintains that officers do not inquire about a person’s immigration status. However, if they run someone’s information and a warrant exists, they say they are required by law to pass that on to the appropriate agency. Houston Mayor John Whitmire announced last week additional oversight measures to an HPD policy for ICE warrants. Credit: April Towery Diaz says that occasionally, people turn in their own spouses or flag down an officer to ask for help with self-deporting. “It’s tough for everybody,” he said. “It’s a very sensitive topic. We’re not insensitive to what is happening in our community.” The chief confirmed that immigration concerns extend beyond the Latino community. “Anybody that you could think of that came over on a visa, if you’re French, if you’re from Asia, it affects everybody. It’s not just our Spanish-speaking community that’s affected,” he said, later referencing the Haitian and Nigerian communities. President Donald Trump recently suggested ending humanitarian protections for more than 350,000 Haitians. U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes blocked the effort, finding that the termination of “temporary protected status” was likely motivated in part by racial prejudice and not a reasoned decision based on conditions in Haiti. U.S. Congressman Chip Roy, a candidate for Texas attorney general, has said all Muslims who practice Sharia law should be deported. Regardless of whether the blame lies with Houston police, ICE or Donald Trump, Morales says there’s no denying that people are afraid. Horror stories from former detainees at centers in Dilley and Conroe liken the facilities to maximum-security prisons or concentration camps. Officials with the Harris County Democratic Party who visited the Joe Corley ICE Processing Center in Conroe last month say they were told by facility employees that there are no windows and the detainees aren’t permitted to go outside. Additionally, they were told that detainees are forced to wake up at 3 a.m., eat spoiled, frozen or undercooked meals, and have limited contact by phone with their attorneys or families. And many, according to Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, are not criminals. The database reports that of the 68,229 currently in detention centers, 73 percent have no criminal convictions. Morales says some undocumented people are more afraid of being held in a detention center than being sent back to a foreign country where they haven’t lived in decades. “It’s so horrible. It’s inhumane. It’s mean. It’s cruel,” she says. “Sometimes I look at those approval ratings and there’s still 30 percent that support Trump. They’re the rich and powerful. They don’t care about us.” Fortunately, Morales says, the Latino community looks out for each other and will continue to do so. “The canceling of the Cinco de Mayo parade is both smart and sad,” she says. “In moments like this, our safety and our long game matter. We move with wisdom. We protect our people. We don’t give anyone an opportunity to twist our joy into something else.” “Latinos have been here for centuries,” she added. “We built cities. We built railroads. We fought in wars. We built businesses. We built families and neighborhoods that thrive despite obstacles. No one can erase that history. No one can erase our contribution.” The post Freedom Parade: Alternative to Canceled Cinco de Mayo Event appeared first on Houston Press.

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