July 27, 2007

Brodner’s Person of the Day: Mariano Lopez

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Mariano Lopez. He is a Mexican immigrant I met in one of the villages (called colonias) on the Texas side of the border for “In America,” a story I did for Texas Monthly 2 years ago. He built a successful construction company from scratch, using his craft and entrepreneurial skills. I painted him building his own home.

Yesterday came word from Father Mike Seifert—who has devoted his life to working with and helping these communities near Brownsville—that Mr. Lopez is being deported and is now in prison.
I saw in him, as I did all the hard working people of the colonias, the face of my grandfather who came to the U.S. in 1919 and opened a fruit stand in Brooklyn. The difference is he was met by the face of the Statue of Liberty. The image of America Mr. Lopez gets is the face of Lou Dobbs. Please seriously consider helping him.

MARIANO LOPEZ FUND
SAN FELIPE DE JESUS CATHOLIC CHURCH
PO BOX 8093
BROWNSVILLE, TX
78526

From Father Mike:

Apparently he was building a house for some people in the Brownsville area. He was close to finishing the house when the people who had hired him asked Mr. Lopez for a loan—and cashed some checks that they had made out to him. Later, they refused to pay him. He stopped work on the house and they filed charges against him for breaking the contract. Upon which he was arrested and, whatever the outcome of the criminal trial, will be placed in deportation proceedings.

Mr. Lopez has been in jail for a month and a half and the family is 4 months behind on making the payments for their lot. Because they have that weird deal called “contract for deed,” the man who sold them the lot can reclaim the lot (house and all) whenever they miss payments. No equity, no justice.

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WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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