Email from Jay J. Johnson-Castro, Sr.

The Spring Break...March Against the Border Wall is a 9-day 115-mile walk from Roma, TX to Brownsville. It will start on March 8 and end on March 16 at the UTB campus. This protest walk/march is being organized by the academic community. It is designed to allow the students, many of which have friends and family on the Mexico side of the Rio Grande, to have a chance to be heard, whether they want to be condemned to a costly and grotesque border wall on American soil that cuts through their community and their land. What better time than Spring Break for the future leaders of America to speak up and be heard?

Through Border Ambassadors networking the 1250 mile Texas-Mexico from El Paso to Brownsville, the entire border region is not caving in, bowing down or bending over to the dictates of the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff. When it comes to our ecology, our environment, our economy, our culture, our history, our geology, our solidarity or our friendship, as long as we live in a democracy, "we the people" of the borderlands will have the final say. To Chertoff, the border is little more than a black line that runs the thread of the Rio Grande. In his mind, the border will be defined as a totalitarian "iron curtain" that will cut through people's lives and community and turn a culture of friendship into a war zone.

For those of us who live in this militarized zone, the region "inside checkpoints" on the north and every form of military surveillance on the south, the border is not a line, but the blend of we the people on both sides of the Rio Grande. It is diverse and tolerant. We get along, despite the political corruption, oppression and racist supremacy from the north. We are the poorest and most neglected region of the great state of Texas. Worse, we are the poorest region of then entire United States of America. Yet, today, because the Texas delegates will more than likely determine the Presidential candidates in the March 4 primaries, and therefore the next President, the Presidential hopefuls are rushing to South Texas to garner the predominantly Hispanic vote.

It will therefore be the vote here in South Texas that tips the scale in the presidential race. We the people "inside the checkpoints" on the Texas-Mexico border will not squander this opportunity. We will make THE difference.

Can we the people of the Texas-Mexico border shape the future of Texas and therefor the entire United States and therefore the world?

"We sure as hell can"

We will...

Jay

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Connecting the dots
...Making a difference

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Border Ambassadors
Jay J. Johnson-Castro, Sr.